LONDON (Alliance News) - Curtis Banks Group PLC on Thursday reported a rise in interim profit and revenue, with an increased dividend payout, as Chief Executive Officer Rupert Curtis steps down from his role.
The financial services company, which provides personal pension investment products, posted a first half pretax profit increase of 17% to GBP4.8 million from GBP4.1 million the year before.
In the six months ended June, revenue increased 7.5% to GBP23.0 million from GBP21.4 million.
Assets under management increased 8.7% to GBP25.1 billion from GBP23.1 billion with 77,552 self invested personal pensions administered in the period, up from 74,900 the year before.
Total organic new SIPPs in the period, however, dropped to 3,512 from 4,534.
Curtis Banks said the slowdown in SIPP investment has been "widely acknowledged" across the industry - largely considered to be caused by the "wider economic uncertainty" in the UK.
The pension provider also said it has seen some advisers "retrench from the pension transfer sector where elements of their business were exposed to defined benefit transfers" as well as increased regulatory scrutiny of all regulated transfer activities.
Curtis Banks declared an increased interim dividend of 2.0 pence, up from 1.5p paid a year ago.
The company also announced that Chief Executive Officer Rupert Curtis will be stepping down from the company at the end of the year. The founder of the company will remain a senior adviser to the company.
His replacement will be Will Self, who CEO of Suffolk Life and deputy CEO of Curtis Banks .
Self was CEO of Suffolk Life when it was acquired by Curtis Banks in 2016. At that time, he joined the board of Curtis Banks.
Looking ahead, Curtis Banks is developing a new SIPP product, which it said is "well advanced" and will be implemented in the second half of the year.
The product will see the company expand into the UK commercial property market, which will increase its cost base, said Curtis Banks.
The company remains confident the initiative will, after a period of transition, result in greater top-line growth.
Curtis Banks believes it is well positioned to grow the business organically and is actively seeking new acquisition opportunities.
CEO Curtis said: "We made good progress during the first half of the year and these results show encouraging growth in profits during a period in which we concentrated on completing our consolidation activities and preparing the launch of our new SIPP proposition.
"As this is my final set of results as chief executive, I would like to thank all of our valued shareholders for their continued support, and I am very pleased to have a strong successor in Will Self who will start in this position in January 2019. I am delighted to confirm that I will remain actively involved as a senior adviser to the business."
Shares in Curtis Banks were down 1.8% at 278.90 pence each Thursday.