The investment business of London-listed Standard Life has reported a rise in both assets under management and profit.

Standard Life Investments boosted its operating pre-tax profit by 33 per cent to £342 million ($488 million) in 2015.

The business saw revenues increase by 23 per cent to £843 million over the year while its assets under management rose from £245.9 billion to £253.2 billion. Within this, third-party assets under management grew by 11 per cent year-on-year to £130.5 billion despite £2.5 billion of outflows from Ignis, the asset management business acquired in 2014. That was a notable improvement from £4.3 billion of outflows Ignis recorded in 2014.

Standard Life Wealth generated net flows of £200 million in 2015 while assets under administration increased from £6.1 to £6.5 billion during the year. 

For the group as a whole, operating profit was up by 9 per cent year-on-year at £665 million. The board proposed a final dividend of 12.34 pence per share making a total of 18.36 pence per share for the year, compared to 17.03 pence per share in 2014.

“During 2015, Standard Life has made considerable progress towards creating a world-class investment company against a backdrop of volatile investment markets and an evolving regulatory landscape,” Standard Life's chief executive, Keith Skeoch, said in a statement.

“Investments are at the heart of what we do and we now manage £253 billion of assets across the globe driven by strong investment performance...While the difficult conditions in global financial markets may persist for some time, Standard Life remains well positioned to meet the needs of clients and customers around the world,” he said.