Standard Life executives add to holdings

Mar 11, 2010

Share with
friends:

Comments (0) Print this article

Life insurer Standard Life's executive directors have added to their shareholdings following Wednesday's full year results.

Chief executive David Nish's wife Caroline has bought 75,000 shares at 206.05p each. This investment of nearly £155,000 takes the Nish family stake to 261,981 shares.

Nish was appointed chief executive at the beginning of 2010 and was previously finance director.

Norman Skeoch, the chief executive of Standard Life Investments, has bought the same number of shares at the same price. Skeoch owns 558,775 shares.

Non-executive chairman Gerald Grimstone acquired 25,000 shares at 203.59p each. That takes his stake to 175,545 shares.

Standard Life is lifting its efficiency targets after delivering 2009 profits ahead of market expectations on Wednesday.

'We are announcing today that we will target a further £100m of efficiency savings by 2012. These savings, which will improve new business margins, will be achieved through transforming our operations to become lower cost and scalable, while maintaining the quality of customer service,' claimed Nish.

Underlying profit before tax in 2009 rose to £291m from £154m the year before, while European Embedded Value (EEV) operating profit before tax dipped to £919m from £933m. That trumped market expectations of a figure around £665m.

Profit attributable to equity shareholders after tax more than doubled to £213m from £100m but the diluted underlying earnings per share (EPS) only edged up to 12p from 11.7p.

On an EEV basis, diluted operating EPS eased to 29.1p from 29.8p.

Gross earned premiums held steady at £3,562m from £3,564m (restated) in 2008.

Top Director Buys

Standard Life (SL.) Director name: Mr Keith Skeoch Amount purchased: 75,000 @ 206.05p Value: £154,538

Standard Life (SL.) Director name: Mr David Thomas Nish Amount purchased: 75,000 @ 206.05p Value: £154,538

Anglo American (AAL) Director name: Sir John Parker Amount purchased: 5,505 @ 2,707.50p Value: £149,048

Prudential (PRU) Director name: Ms Bridget Macaskill Amount purchased: 15,000 @ 524.50p Value: £78,675

Leaf Clean Energy (LEAF) Director name: Mr Peter Tom Amount purchased: 100,000 @ 60.00p Value: £60,000

Standard Life (SL.) Director name: Mr Gerry Grimstone Amount purchased: 25,000 @ 203.59p Value: £50,898

Angel Mining (ANGM) Director name: Mr Francis David Sherston Chapman Amount purchased: 500,000 @ 7.00p Value: £35,000

Leaf Clean Energy (LEAF) Director name: Mr Bran Keogh Amount purchased: 50,000 @ 62.00p Value: £31,000

Leaf Clean Energy (LEAF) Director name: Mr Bran Keogh Amount purchased: 50,000 @ 60.00p Value: £30,000

Pennon Group (PNN) Director name: Mr Gerard Connell Amount purchased: 4,000 @ 521.39p Value: £20,856

Top Director Sells

Brit Insurance Holdings NV (BRE) Director name: Mr Dane Jonathan Douetil Amount sold: 24,227 @ 745.13p Value: £180,523

Fuller Smith and Turner (FSTA) Director name: Mr Simon Emeny Amount sold: 30,000 @ 540.00p Value: £162,000

Amlin (AML) Director name: Mr Brian D Carpenter Amount sold: 27,492 @ 419.39p Value: £115,299

Brit Insurance Holdings NV (BRE) Director name: Mr Matthew Scales Amount sold: 12,112 @ 745.13p Value: £90,250

Senior (SNR) Director name: Mr M Rollins Amount sold: 80,435 @ 90.10p Value: £72,472

Senior (SNR) Director name: Mr Michael Sheppard Amount sold: 36,673 @ 90.10p Value: £33,042

Comments (0)

Share with
friends:

Leave a comment

This will be the name displayed with your comment.

This helps us verify comments are genuine. It will not be displayed anywhere on the site and is stored confidentially.

Please keep your comment within 1,000 characters and relevant to the main topic. We encourage healthy debate, but we don't allow insults or bad language. Anything off topic or unpleasant, we'll remove. Enjoy the conversation! Thank you.

captcha To prevent spam-related comments please enter the characters shown in the 'Captcha' box to the left.

By leaving a comment you accept our terms and conditions.


FREE - MoneyWeek's daily investment emailJohn Stepek

Our free daily email, Money Morning, is an informative and enjoyable analysis of what's going on in the markets. Written by our Editor, John Stepek, and guest contributors.
Sign up FREE to Money Morning here.

>