AJ Bell: DIY investment firm ups dividend after reaching customer ‘milestone’
AJ Bell upped its dividend after the firm reached another “milestone” with over half a million customers on its platform business.
Revenue at the DIY investment firm rose by 27 per cent to £131.3m in the first half of the year, up from £103.6m in the same period last year. This helped pretax profit jump by 47 per cent to £61.4m.
On the back of these results, AJ Bell announced an interim dividend of 4.25p per share, up 21 per cent against last year.
The firm reported that it now has over half a million customers on its platform business, with 27,000 added in the first half of the year.
Assets under administration in its platform business rose 13 per cent in the first half to a record £80.3bn. This came thanks to net inflows of £2.9bn and favourable market movements of £6.5bn.
Assets under management at its investment management business rose 23 per cent in the first half too. Net inflows were £800m, marginally weaker than last year’s figure of £900m.
“I am pleased to announce an excellent set of first-half results. Our dual-channel platform continued to deliver strong organic growth with 27,000 customers added in the period and total platform customers surpassing half a million, a significant milestone for the business,” Michael Summersgill, chief executive said.
“The board has recently approved a new capital allocation framework which reaffirms our commitment to a progressive annual ordinary dividend,” he continued.
Summersgill noted that its performance was “particularly strong” in the first half due to delays to the firm’s pricing. This was caused by “regulatory uncertainty” relating to the interest margins at the end of 2023.
“These metrics will moderate in the second half as customers begin to benefit from lower overall charges, however our updated full-year guidance reflects our expectation that both revenue and PBT will be higher than we had anticipated back in December,” he said.