St. James's Place plc (STJ) Q2 2026 Earnings Call

Investor webinar replay

Replay transcript excerpt

Good morning and welcome to our 2026 half-year results presentation. I'm pleased to report a strong set of results for St. James's Place, reflecting both good financial performance and continued operational and strategic progress. Thank you for watching. This is reflected in our new business performance. Net inflows for the period were £2.7 billion, supported by gross inflows of £10.5 billion. We also saw an improvement in fund retention to 95.4%. This was above our long-term ambition of 95% and reflects the quality and longevity of relationships we and our advisors build with clients. FUM increased to over 240 billion pounds during the first half, driven by both positive net inflows and strong investment performance. Investment returns represented 16.4% of opening FUM on an annualized basis, net of all charges. This return reflects the value we deliver to clients through our distinctive investment management approach and our proprietary range of funds and portfolios. All of this helps clients to achieve their long-term financial goals. The strong growth in FUM combined with our new business outturn has translated into good financial results for the first half. We've delivered an adjusted IFRS before tax result of £278.4 million and Caroline will walk through the detail behind this shortly. Both our client and advisor communities grew during the period with a net 27,000 new clients up nearly 3% and an increase in advisor numbers to 4,951 at the end of June. Overall, the results show that our business is in good shape. These results also reflect the benefits of the investments we've made across the business. In a competitive marketplace, we continue to focus on strengthening our client and advisor propositions. With that, I'll hand over to Caroline to take you through...