Phoenix Group Holdings (LON: PHNX) have seen their shares boosted after the firm gave shareholders a positive update
The FTSE100 (INDEXFTSE: UKX) listed firm announced that it exceeded its cash generation target on business growth.
The Phoenix Group is one of the largest providers of insurance services. It is also the largest specialist consolidator of heritage life assurance funds in Europe.
Their main focus has traditionally been on closed life fund consolidation where we specialize in the acquisition and management of closed life insurance and pension funds.
Shares of Phoenix Group were boosted 1.94% to trade at 747p. 28/11/19 15:17BST.
Earlier this month, Phoenix announced the appointment of a new Chief Executive in the form of Andy Briggs who was former boss at Aviva (LON: AV).
Big players in the industry such as Lloyd’s (LON: LLOY) have seen their profits sink in the most recent quarter, and other names such as AIG (NYSE: AIG) have struggled to gain ground after testing trading conditions, and hence Phoenix have made efforts to change fortunes.
Phoenix said it has generated £707 million of cash in 2019, exceeding the upper end of its £600 million to £700 million target. In 2018, cash generation amounted to £664 million.
It also continued to meet, or exceed, customer service metrics, it said, and remains on track to deliver the £1.2 billion total synergy target for its Standard Life Assurance purchase.
Phoenix acquired the Standard Life Assurance Unit from wealth manager Standard Life Aberdeen PLC (LON: SLA) in 2018 for £1.97 billion.
Following this deal, this allowed Phoenix to become one of Europe’s largest consolidators of heritage funds following gate deal and consolidated a strategic partnership with Standard Life Aberdeen.
“This trading update further reinforces Phoenix’s conviction in its business model and its capacity to generate cash, deliver resilience and exploit multiple avenues of growth to deliver long-term sustainable cash generation, not just today but in the years ahead,” said Chief Executive Clive Bannister in his Capital Markets Day statement.
