The UK investment platform’s pre-tax profits jumped 24% from £11.2m to £13.9m in the six months to 31 March 2018, a period in which it announced it was planning to float on the LSE.
The group also posted record revenue growth of 16%, up from £37m in the first half of last year to £42.9m.
Chief executive Andy Bell said the H1 18 figures were the most profitable results in the firm’s history and further reflect the strength of its market position.
“The UK retail investment and savings market continues to display strong growth and investment platforms are central to this. Our brand heritage, platform technology and positioning across both advised and direct-to-consumer markets enables us to benefit from this long-term growth story.”
Growing market share
AJ Bell said its customer base had grown 12% to 183,482 over the first half of the year and that it had retained 95% of its users.
Earlier this year it sliced the annual management charges on its managed portfolio service (MPS) by 40%, which it claims makes the product one of the cheapest options in the market.
Net platform inflows totalled £3.5bn, up 17% from the £3.0bn net inflows seen in H1 17.
Its assets under administration rose 5% to £41.8bn during the period, which it said was driven chiefly by the performance of its platform business.
This comes despite increased market volatility over the first quarter, which has seen a number of fund groups recording a fall in assets.
Off the back of its healthy interim figures, the group hiked its interim dividend by 10% to 14p per share.
IPO
Alongside the results, Bell confirmed that the investment platform was progressing well with its plans to list on the LSE by later this year or 2019.
Reports swirled in February that the firm was plotting an IPO, a move which chief executive Andy Bell (pictured) confirmed the following month.
Ahead of the planned flotation, Neil Woodford sold down his 8% stake in the firm, worth £40m, to his former employer Invesco Perpetual and Bell who now own 44% and 28% respectively.
The IPO is expected to value AJ Bell at £500m.
