Mutually-owned Royal London, the life insurance, pensions and investment company, announced its 2024 results showing assets under management increased to a record £173 billion and operating profit before tax increased 11% to £277 million.
The Royal London group employs roughly 1,000 in Scotland and includes the former Scottish Life and Scottish Provident businesses.
The mutual said its ProfitShare scheme delivered £181 million “to be shared in April 2025 with 2.3 million eligible customers who have pensions and life policies with Royal London.”
It said the Governed Range, its flagship fund offering, attracted net inflows of £3.2 billion with assets under management (AUM) reaching £72 billion.
Royal London said it paid 98.7% of protection claims, delivering £751 million to over 65,000 customers.
The group announced its entry into the bulk purchase annuity market in September 2024 and completed three buy-in transactions with £187 million of premiums.
It made its first natural capital asset purchase, acquiring one of the UK’s largest prime farmland assets, while also investing into its UK Living strategy with the purchase of 500 apartments in the Thames Valley.
“Investment performance of actively managed funds remains good, with 60% (2023: 96%) outperforming their three-year benchmark on an AUM weighted basis and 81% of funds (2023: 89%) outperforming on an equally weighted basis …” said the group.
“Life and pensions new business sales were up 17% to £10,804m (2023: £9,253m) with growth across all products, including a 19% increase in Workplace Pensions due to a rise in both transfer volumes and the number of new schemes won.
“Gross inflows rose to £31.8bn (2023: £29.9bn). Net outflows of £1.0bn (2023: £4.2bn net inflows) were impacted by £4.3bn of external net outflows from Global Equities strategies following the departure of some members of the Global Equities team.”
Royal London CEO Barry O’Dwyer said: “Royal London is customer-owned and is run for the benefit of customers, not shareholders. We share our profits with eligible customers and our ProfitShare scheme will distribute £181m to 2.3 million customers in April. This was underpinned by the business delivering an 11% increase in operating profit to £277m in 2024.
“Our customer focus means we continually enhance our offerings and digital services to help customers build their financial resilience, often partnering with independent financial advisers. We have recently launched an innovative new online application process for individual pensions business, making it substantially easier for advisers to work with us.
“Our customer-first approach also appeals to employers wanting to pick the best possible offering and, in 2024, nearly 1,000 employers chose to establish a Royal London Workplace Pension scheme, very often moving from a shareholder-owned competitor.
“2024 also saw Royal London enter the bulk purchase annuity market, giving trustees the option of choosing the only customer-owned provider in this market.”