The group attributed the "significant growth in new business sales" to the strength of its individual pensions, group pensions and drawdown propositions.
Operating profit before tax and exceptional items rose 12% to £220m, largely due to its intermediary pensions and wealth business, resulting in new business profits of £85m (2013: £70m) and existing business profits of £159m (2013: £140m).
Group funds under management now stand at £82.3bn (+12%).
However profit from continuing operations before tax and profit share dropped 53% to £259m, partly due to a one-off £61m charge relating to the workplace pensions charge cap and the historically low yields on government bonds at the end of 2014.
Phil Loney, Group Chief Executive of Royal London, said:
“The last year was marked by a very strong trading performance and a healthy increase in operating profit. New business performance was strong with particularly good contributions from group pensions and sales of income drawdown products. We anticipate that these will continue to be areas of growth for some time to come.
"We are building our protection offering. The intermediary protection business is seeing a positive response to the improvements we made in the final quarter to both technology and improved critical illness definitions. Our consumer protection business has been growing significantly since it started marketing insurance products direct to consumers in Q4 2014. Our new Consumer division is now offering three new products.
"Our strong trading profit performance was offset in the short term by the impact of the government's decision to introduce a price cap and other alterations into auto enrolled pension schemes, and the impact of even lower yields. Royal London members who hold our workplace pension products will benefit from lower prices under the price cap, so the value has not been lost to members as a whole. The profitable growth of sales and market share across our product range provides a sound platform for future performance."
