STANDARD LIFE’S Irish businesses posted sales of £1.29 billion (€1.5 billion) in 2010 – up 51 per cent compared to the preceding year, the company has said.

The insurance group, which operates two businesses here, said new sales at Standard Life Ireland rose 22 per cent to £598 million. The company’s offshore bonds business – Standard Life International which provides products primarily to UK investors – had increased sales of 89 per cent to £700 million.

Standard Life International chief executive Nigel Dunne said the group’s Irish operations performed “exceptionally well last year despite the difficult environment”. However, he warned of tougher times ahead for the Irish pensions industry and called on the new Government to make pensions more attractive to consumers by keeping taxes low.

The Standard Life group said it had made a strong start to 2011.

The Edinburgh-based company made an operating profit of £425 million last year, up from £399 million the previous year.

The former mutual has moved away from traditional policies in favour of less capital-intensive savings products since ditching its customer-owned status and listing on the stock market in 2006.

The insurer has also been at the forefront of an industry drive to cut costs by halting commission payments to middlemen, pre-empting new regulations that come into force in the UK in 2012.

Standard Life plunged 7.3 per cent to 226.9p yesterday, its largest slide since March 2009 after reporting that its cash generation dropped 6 per cent in 2010, falling short of analysts’ estimates.

The stock has risen 20 per cent in the past year, outperforming a 15 per cent gain in the Stoxx 600 European insurance share index.

Standard Life is paying a dividend for 2010 of 13p, an increase of 6.2 per cent. – (Additional reporting by Reuters/Bloomberg)