In its half year results published today (August 12), Aviva said its adviser platform market saw assets under management increase by 29 per cent to £37bn.
Savings and retirement net flows were up 24 per cent, benefiting from strong performance in both workplace and platform.
The FTSE 100 firm said its adviser platform business continued to grow reflecting record sales in the first quarter, with net flows coming in the top three across the business.
“At an annualised 17 per cent of opening assets this is one of the highest rates of growth across large adviser platforms with over £20bn in assets,” it said.
It reported that this was its best half year sales in general insurance in a decade and record flows into savings and retirement.
Earlier this year Aviva reported net fund flows were up 6 per cent in its adviser platform space in its full year results for the period ended December 31, 2020.
Despite record sales, the net inflows onto Aviva's adviser platform were still significantly less than the £6.2bn posted in 2017, before its replatforming debacle, and also failed to beat 2018's £3.9bn.
But since then Aviva Financial Advice launched its simplified advice to offer advice on investments, in addition to pensions, annuities and defined benefit transfers.
Meanwhile, in the results this morning, the firm also reported a loss of £198m - compared to a profit of £874m in the first half of 2020 - which it attributed to the one-off cost of selling its French operation.
Alongside its half year results, Aviva also said it would return at least £4bn to shareholders by next June, as part of its decision to sell eight businesses in eight month.
The firm said the total amount, which includes a £750m share buyback, was within the range estimates provided by analysts.
Amanda Blanc, Aviva's chief executive, said: "We have made good progress on all fronts in the 12 months since we launched our strategy.
"We delivered strong cash remittances of £1.1bn in the first half and we are on track to achieve our objective of over £5bn in cash remittances between 2021 and 2023. In light of our confidence in the strength of the business and underlying cash flows, the board has declared a 5 per cent increase in the interim dividend to 7.35 pence per share."
Blanc added: "We also delivered some of our best ever sales figures in the first six months. In UK general insurance we delivered our highest sales in a decade. In savings and retirement, net flows increased by 24 per cent to a record £5.2bn, and we've added 100,000 new workplace customers, reinforcing our number one position.
"Alongside delivering growth, we continue to focus on reducing controllable costs, which are down 2 per cent. We are on track to deliver our £300m savings target in 2022 and are focused on achieving top quartile efficiency in all our businesses.
"While we've got more to do, our half year results show we have what it takes to drive growth in our businesses. We remain completely focused on transforming performance, capitalising on the breadth of Aviva, making insurance simple and easy for our customers, and creating value for our shareholders."
sonia.rach@ft.com
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