LONDON, March 15 (Reuters) - British insurer Legal & General posted a 14 percent rise in 2015 operating profit to1.46 billion pounds ($2.08 billion) on Tuesday, boosted bydemand for products such as lifetime mortgages and the use ofless capital in its annuity business.
The profit was in line with expectations from analysts in acompany-supplied poll.
Net cash generation was 1.26 billion pounds, against aforecast of 1.22 billion.
Legal & General Investment Management, one of the biggestinvestors in the UK stock market, had assets under management of746 billion pounds, a rise of 8 percent, after seeing externalnet inflows of 37.7 billion.
The company said it had a solvency capital ratio under newEuropean rules of 169 percent. A ratio of 100 percent showsinsurers have sufficient capital to cover underwriting,investment and operational risks.
Barclays had forecast the solvency ratio in a 160-170percent range.
L&G said it would pay a total dividend of 13.4 pence, up 19 percent from 2014 and in line with forecasts.($1 = 0.7014 pounds) (Reporting by Carolyn Cohn; editing by Simon Jessop)
Legal & General (LGEN)
