Stockbroker and investment platform AJ Bell has revealed a record-breaking profit haul after completing its first year as a public company.
The group, which floated last December, saw pre-tax profits surge by a third to £37.7 million in the year to September 30, on sales up 17% to £104.9 million.
It cheered a 17% rise in retail customers to 232,066, as its two flagship platforms proved popular with investors.
This also helped assets under management swell by 13% to £52.3 billion, with AJ Bell shrugging off volatile market conditions as stocks have been buffeted by global trade worries.
READ MORE: Scotland’s finest family-owned firms shine at Herald awards
AJ Bell has seen shares rise by more than 75% since it listed on the London stock market a year ago.
The stock has eased back after its stellar run and was down 4% after the full-year figures on Thursday.
Andy Bell, chief executive at AJ Bell, said: "These results are a strong endorsement of the business model and growth strategy that we outlined in the run up to our IPO a year ago."
AJ Bell also announced plans to share its success with charitable causes.
It is launching a new share option plan that will pay out about £10 million to charities if it can boost earnings per share by 100% over three years and 150% in five years.
The amount that banks are lending to business is growing slower than at any point in the last five years as Brexit and other political uncertainty weighs on the market, new data reveals.
Growth is expected to hit just 2.1% in 2020, the smallest increase since 2015.
READ MORE: ScottishPower unveils plans to put solar panels next to wind turbines
Companies that rely on trade with the European Union are likely to be sitting tight in the wait for more clarity on Brexit, said Omar Ali, a partner at accountancy firm EY, which compiled the data.
This is unlikely to change soon, he added.
"Even if the withdrawal deal is ratified early next year, this won't get rid of the uncertainty entirely as the UK's future relationship with the EU will still need to be worked out," he said.
It comes as household income in real terms grew by a fairly healthy 2% this year, and is expected to expand by 1.7% in 2020.
This is not filtering through to consumer credit though, which is forecast to grow by 3.8% this year, its weakest growth since 2013, and down from a peak of 8.3% in 2017.
Demand for new cars fell 1.3% last month, the automotive industry said.
Some 2,018 fewer cars were registered in November than during the same month in 2018, according to the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT).
READ MORE: Quiz issues warning on loss-making stores
This maintains the downward trend for new car registrations throughout 2019 as the industry has been hit by weak business and consumer confidence, economic uncertainty and confusion over diesel and clean air zones, the trade association said.
The decline was driven by a 6.1% drop in demand from private consumers.
Sales of diesel models were down 27.2%, while demand for petrol cars grew by 2.0%.
Alternatively fuelled cars such as hybrids and battery electrics took a record market share for the second consecutive month.
More than one in 10 cars joining the UK roads was either hybrid, plug-in hybrid or pure electric.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article