PRUDENTIAL PLC FULL YEAR 2024 RESULTS: BUILDING TOWARDS OUR 2027 STRATEGIC OBJECTIVES
Prudential plc (“Prudential”; HKEX: 2378; LSE: PRU) today announced its financial results for the year ended 31 December 2024.
Performance highlights on a constant exchange rate basis unless otherwise stated
All new business profit growth rates in this report are reported on a constant exchange rate basis, and excluding interest rate and other economic movements, unless otherwise stated.
- New business profit of $3,078 million, up 11 per cent. Including the effects of interest rates and other economic movements, new business profit was broadly flat. TEV new business profit also up 11 per cent.
- Operating free surplus generated from in-force insurance and asset management business of $2,642 million (2023: $2,706 million) was in line with the shape of free surplus generation we set out from 2022 to 2027. We continue to invest in improving our operating model, to build capabilities and create value, including through addressing variances.
- Adjusted operating profit before tax increased 10 per cent to $3,129 million. Adjusted operating profit after tax increased by 7 per cent to $2,582 million. Earnings per share based on adjusted operating profit was 89.7 cents per share, representing an increase of 8 per cent on a consistent basis with 2023 (before the adjustment in respect of the non-controlling interest in our Malaysia conventional life business).
- Group EEV equity of $44.2 billion (2023: $45.3 billion on an actual exchange rate basis) equivalent to 1,664 cents per share (2023: 1,643 cents per share on an actual exchange rate basis).
- Strong capital position with free surplus ratio of 234 per cent and GWS shareholder surplus over GPCR of $15.9 billion, equivalent to a cover ratio of 280 per cent. Allowing for the share buyback programme completion, payment of the 2024 second interim dividend and the commencement of the new bancassurance arrangement in Indonesia, the free surplus ratio would be 204 per cent.
- Completed $1,045 million (123 million shares) in share buybacks as at 14 March under our $2 billion programme announced in June 2024. This programme is now expected to complete by the end of 2025 rather than our original guidance of mid-2026.
- 2024 total dividend of 23.13 cents per share, up 13 per cent, with 2024 second interim dividend of 16.29 cents per share. Including share buybacks total shareholder returns in FY24 were $1.4 billion.
Commenting on the results, CEO Anil Wadhwani, said: “In 2024 we made good progress in executing on our strategy to improve our operational capabilities and deliver growth. Our financial performance was in line with our guidance, with new business profit up 11 per cent and operating free surplus generated of $2,642 million. On a traditional embedded value (TEV) basis, which we will be converting to from Q1 2025, new business profit also grew 11 per cent in the year. The long-term growth trends inherent in our Asia and Africa markets are reasserting themselves, creating significant opportunities for us. Insurance penetration rates in Asia are low and there is continued, and growing, demand for long term savings and protection products across our markets, alongside a need for wealth management and retirement planning, particularly in our higher income Asian markets.
“We are well positioned to capitalise on this growth opportunity. Our focus is on writing quality new business alongside managing our in-force business and improving variances by enhancing operational delivery and serving our customers’ needs. We have seen good progress in 2024 with improved cash signatures for new business, growth in the number of active agents in the second half and actions undertaken to improve our variances through implementing better health claims management, improving persistency and modernising our IT infrastructure to capture economies of scale.
“The dividend for 2024 is up 13 per cent on a per share basis and amounts to just over $600 million. This is alongside the $785 million we returned to shareholders in 2024 through our $2 billion share buyback programme, which we have accelerated to complete by the end of 2025 ahead of our original mid-2026 schedule. We have also announced that we are evaluating a potential listing of ICICI Prudential Asset Management Company Limited involving the partial divestment of our shares in that company, subject to market conditions, requisite approvals and other considerations. It is intended that following the completion of such a divestment, the net proceeds would be returned to shareholders. These initiatives underscore our disciplined capital management based on the clear framework communicated in June 2024 and our focus on improving shareholder returns. We intend to update you on our capital management plans at our half year 2025 Results in August.”
| Key summary financials | 2024 $m | 2023 $m | Change on AER basis | Change on CER basisi |
| New business profit | 3,078 | 3,125 | (2)% | 11% |
| Operating fee surplusii | 2,642 | 2,740 | (4)% | (2)% |
| Group EEV equityiii | 44,218 | 45,250 | (2)% | n/a |
| Adjusted operating profit before tax | 3,129 | 2,893 | 8% | 10% |
| Adjusted operating profit after tax | 2,582 | 2,449 | 5% | 7% |
| IFRS profit after tax | 2,415 | 1,712 | 41% | 43% |
| IFRS shareholders’ equityiii | 17,492 | 17,823 | (2)% | n/a |
i for NBP only excluding interest rate and other economic movements.
ii generated from in-force insurance and asset management business.
iii Balance sheet metrics are presented after deduction of non-controlling interests. For 2024 non-controlling interests include the 49 per cent non-controlling interest in our conventional life business in Malaysia.
Business Performance
We are writing quality new business with improved cash signatures alongside improving operational delivery and better serving our customers’ needs. The investment in, and focus on, our customer, distribution, and health strategic pillars is creating strong and stable platforms to support our future growth.
We are focused on building momentum in our agency channel by prioritising quality recruitment and through improving agent activation and productivity across all our markets. We are already seeing benefits, with our active agent count being 67,000 in the second half of 2024, up from 63,000 in the first half. Agency new business profit momentum improved in the second half of 2024, being 4 per cent higher than the same period in the prior year, compared with the (5) per cent decrease seen in the first half given the strong performance in 2023 when the Hong Kong border re-opened. Overall, new business profit per active agent grew 5 per cent. Key actions we are taking to drive the performance of the agency channel are quality recruitment, including through expanding our PRUVenture career development programme, partnering with MDRT.org to enhance agent training and development and continuing to invest in PRUForce, our agency digital platform, to improve our agents’ productivity and our operational efficiency.
Bancassurance new business profit increased by 31 per cent. New business margins improved, before allowing for the effects of interest rate and other economic movements, driven by a higher contribution to APE sales from Health and Protection products, which now represent 8 per cent of our bancassurance APE sales. 14 markets achieved double-digit year-on-year growth in new business profit, led by Hong Kong, Singapore, and Taiwan. We also further strengthened our bancassurance platform with new strategic partnerships in Indonesia and by launching new wealth and health and protection products.
Health new business profit grew 11 per cent to $346 million, with growth led by Hong Kong, Singapore, and Indonesia, supported by new healthcare products, repricing initiatives, and further training and enablement of our agency force. Creating a specialist health pillar and sharing best practice across our health businesses has given us first-mover advantage on repricing, which has helped offset the effects of medical inflation.
We have achieved top quartile relationship Net Promoter Scores (rNPS) in five markets, improving from four markets in 2023, with all ten markets in which we measure rNPS now ranked in the first or second quartile. This reflects strong customer satisfaction, driven by continuous improvement in customer experience, and enhancement of our customer digital servicing platform, PRUServices, which we expect to have deployed in seven business units by the end of the first quarter of 2025.
Eastspring Investments reported strong net inflows from third parties (excluding money market funds and funds managed on behalf of M&G) of $6.5 billion (2023: $4.1 billion), contributing to total funds under management and advice (FUM) at 31 December 2024 of $258 billion. The growth in FUM reflects improved investment market conditions, better investment performance, and strong in-house and external retail momentum. We see asset management as an integrated part of the Prudential franchise.
Outlook
Our multi-channel and multi-growth model and our focus on operational delivery positions us well for 2025. We remain focused on quality growth and consistent execution of our transformation programme with 2025 marking the inflection point for growth in our gross operating free surplus generation. We expect to grow each of new business profit, basic earnings per share based on adjusted operating profit and operating free surplus generated from in-force insurance and asset management business by more than 10 per cent in 2025, all based on constant exchange rates. Based on this, we expect the dividend per share to increase by at least 10 per cent, in line with our dividend guidance.
Since announcing our strategy in 2023, we substantially reset our focus on Customer, Distribution and Health. We have been building and modernising our capabilities through targeted investments to address the historic under investment, including digitising and harmonising our core operations and infrastructure. Our investments are transforming our ways of working across all aspects of our business. We believe during 2025 and into 2026, we will further evolve our capabilities to a level that will position us strongly for accelerated growth. Looking further ahead, based on our relentless focus on writing quality new business, managing our in-force business and improving our net experience variances, we remain confident in achieving our 2027 financial and strategic objectives and generating sustainable value for our shareholders and other stakeholders.
KEY SUMMARY FINANCIALS
Earnings
| Key summary financials | 2024 $m | 2023 $m | Change on AER basis | Change on CER basis |
| Adjusted operating profit | 3,129 | 2,893 | 8% | 10% |
| Adjusted operating profit after tax | 2,582 | 2,449 | 5% | 7% |
| Basic earnings per share based on adjusted operating profit* (cents) | 89.7 | 89.0 | 1% | 2% |
| IFRS profit after tax | 2,415 | 1,712 | 41% | 43% |
| Basic Earnings per share based on IFRS profit after tax* (cents) | 84.1 | 62.1 | 35% | 37% |
Value
| Key summary financials | 2024 $m | 2023 $m | Change on AER basis | Change on CER basisi |
| APE sales | 6,202 | 5,876 | 6% | 7% |
| Present value new business premiums (PVNBP) | 30,612 | 28,737 | 7% | 8% |
| New business profit (EEV) | 3,078 | 3,125 | (2)% | 11% |
| New business margin (% APE) | 50 | 53 | (3)ppts | 2ppts |
| Life weighted premium income | 25,409 | 24,001 | 6% | 7% |
| Group EEV equity* | 44,218 | 45,250 | (2)% | n/a |
| Group EEV equity per share (US$)* | 16.64 | 16.43 | 1% | n/a |
| EEV operating profit | 4,828 | 4,546 | 6% | 7% |
| Operating return on embedded value (%) | 12 | 12 | -ppts | n/a |
| Group EEV per share ($)* | 16.36 | 16.15 | 1% | n/a |
| Eastspring funds under management / advice ($bn) | 258.0 | 237.1 | 9% | n/a |
Capital
| Key summary financials | 2024 $m | 2023 $m | Change on AER basis |
| IFRS shareholders’ equity* | 17,492 | 17,823 | (2)% |
| IFRS shareholders’ equity per share (US$)* | 6.58 | 6.47 | 2% |
| Operating return on IFRS shareholders’ equity (%)* | 14 | 14 | -ppts |
| Adjusted total comprehensive equity*# | 36,660 | 37,346 | (2)% |
| Operating free surplusii | 2,642 | 2,740 | (4)% |
| Free surplus excluding distribution rights and other intangibles* | 8,604 | 8,518 | 1% |
| Free surplus ratio (%) | 234 | 242 | (8)ppts |
| Group leverage ratio (Moody’s basis) (%) | 13 | 14 | (1)ppts |
| Shareholders GWS coverage ratio over GPCR (%) | 280 | 295 | (15)ppts |
| Total GWS coverage ratio over GPCR (%) | 203 | 197 | 6ppts |
| Dividend per share (cents) | 23.13 | 20.47 | 13% |
* Presented after deduction of non-controlling interests. For 2024 non-controlling interests include the 49 per cent non-controlling interest in our conventional life business in Malaysia.
# Includes IFRS shareholders’ equity and contractual service margin net of tax and other adjustments. See “Definitions of Performance Metrics” in our Annual Results Document for further information.
i for NBP only excluding interest rate and other economic movements.
ii generated from in-force insurance and asset management business.
Notes
The summary financials presented above are the key financial metrics Prudential’s management use to assess and manage the performance and position of the business. In addition to the metrics prepared in accordance with IFRS standards – IFRS profit after tax and IFRS shareholders’ equity – additional metrics are prepared on alternative bases. The presentation of these key metrics is not intended to be considered as a substitute for, or superior to, financial information prepared and presented in accordance with IFRS Standards. The definitions of the key metrics we use to discuss our performance in this press release are set out in the “Definition of performance metrics” section in our Annual Results Document, including, where relevant, references to where these metrics are reconciled to the most directly comparable IFRS measure.