AJ Bell has announced a record revenue of £269.4m in its latest annual results, a figure up 23% on last year.

The investment platform also recorded a pre-tax profit of £113.3m in the year to 30 September, which was an increase of 29% on the previous year’s performance.

AJ Bell said the results were aided by a year of strong growth across its dual-channel platform, with 66,000 customers added to close at 542,000, a figure up 14% over the year.

This helped to take the investment platform’s assets under administration (AUA) to a new record of £86.5bn – up 22% from £70-.9bn last year. AJ Bell’s net inflows totalled £6.1bn over the 12 months, up from £4.2bn a year previously.

“The continued growth of our business, underpinned by our scalable operating model, drove record financial performance in the year, with profit before tax up 29% to £113.3m,” AJ Bell CEO, Michael Summersgill, said.

“Backed by our strong profitability and highly cash-generative business model, we have accumulated significant surplus capital above our regulatory requirements.”

AJ Bell also announced a final dividend of 8.25 pence per share, increasing the total ordinary dividend for the year by 16% to 12.50 pence per share, which marks the twentieth consecutive year of ordinary dividend growth for investment platform.

The group also outlined details of a share buyback programme of up to £30m, which it said reflects its “strong cash generation, healthy capital position and commitment to return surplus capital” to shareholders.

“We have today announced a record level of shareholder returns, reflecting the Board’s confidence in the long-term outlook for AJ Bell,” Summersgill added.

“In line with our new capital allocation framework, we have announced a share buyback programme to return up to £30m to shareholders. This level of buyback reflects our current capital position.

“However, we see opportunities for further shareholder returns in future, over and above a progressive ordinary dividend, as we continue to deliver on our growth strategy.”

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