Market rally lifts St James Place

3rd Nov 2009 07:53

Strong demand for investment products as equity markets rallied helped new business pick up at wealth manager St James Place over the past three months.On an annual premium basis, total new business in the quarter to September rose 3% to £104.6m. The combined single investment and pension business, including unit trusts, increased by 12% during the third quarter to £834.8m. Unit trust business up 41%.Total regular premium business declined during the quarter principally due to the inclusion of a large stakeholder scheme within the comparative figure for last year, St James said. Funds under management rose by 25% or £4bn to £20.3bn since the start of the year and by £3.4bn in the last three months. There was a net inflow of funds under management of £600m (2008: £500m)."We are very pleased that we have returned to growth in the third quarter and in particular with the strong performance in our manufactured business and the growth in investment business," chief executvie David Bellamy said.