By Simon Jessop
LONDON (Reuters) - Wealth manager Quilter <QLT.L> posted a 2 percent rise in total assets as it announced its maiden set of results as a standalone company, buoyed by net inflows of new client money.
Quilter was spun out of Anglo-South African insurance company Old Mutual earlier this year as part of a broader break-up that also saw Quilter sell its single-strategy asset management business.
Assets under administration and management in the six months to end-June were 116.5 billion pounds, up 2 percent from end-December, it said in a statement, with net inflows of 2.2 billion pounds.
That helped underpin a 16 percent rise in adjusted pretax profit to 110 million pounds from the same period a year earlier, it added.
As a result of the sale of its single strategy business, Quilter said it would also return 221 million pounds to investors in the form of a special dividend of 12 pence a share.
"After three years of essentially flat annual profits given the investment in the business, the return to growth with an increase in adjusted profit... is particularly pleasing," Chief Executive Paul Feeney said.
(Reporting by Simon Jessop; editing by Silvia Aloisi)
