Phoenix Group is on track to transfer £21.3bn ($33.5bn) of assets to Standard Life Investments (SLI) by the end of this year.
The transfer was part of the agreement struck by Phoenix when it sold its asset management arm, Ignis, to SLI in March. The sum represents around half of the assets that Phoenix expects to move to SLI. The process will continue in 2015.
Before its sale to SLI, Ignis had around £70bn of assets under management, of which about 80% was on behalf of Phoenix.
Speaking at Phoenix's investor day on 25 November, Tony Kassimiotis, director of operations, said the outsourcing of assets was part of the insurer's overall operating model. Policy administration, IT and financial management are all outsourced, presenting the firm with variable rather than fixed costs. This is vital for a closed-life insurer such as Phoenix as its level of activity is rarely steady - its policies will naturally run off over time, but equally they may increase as it acquires further chunks of back books.
SLI is now largest supplier of asset management services to Phoenix, alongside Henderson and Castle Hill. Fund accounting is outsourced to HSBC.
People:Tony Kassimiotis