By Nishant Kumar
LONDON (Reuters) - Jupiter Fund Management (L:JUP) said funds under management (FuM) rose to a record 33.1 billion pounds in the June quarter, boosted by net inflows worth 1.3 billion pounds, mainly into its fixed income products.
The money manager, which started the year with 31.7 billion pounds in assets, took a net 875 million pounds into its mutual funds alone during the quarter, it said in a statement, although it said it expected to lose a large mandate later in the year.
Jupiter's management fees rose by 10 million pounds to 141 million pounds during the period but its fee margin fell to 87 basis points as a result of flows into lower-margin fixed income products.
The fund house strengthened presence in international markets, adding resources in Europe and Asia, increasing the headcount to 23 people from five in the last 18 months.
"These changes increase our focus on key clients around the world and have produced encouraging results to date," Maarten Slendebroek, Jupiter's chief executive said in the statement.
The company reported a pretax profit of 48.4 million pounds and said it had maintained its operating margins above 50 percent.
It also announced an interim dividend of 3.7 pence as part of a progressive dividend policy and reiterated its commitment to issuing special dividends.
Jupiter said roughly three quarters of the assets in its mutual funds had delivered first and second quartile investment performance in three years ending June 2014.
(Reporting by Nishant Kumar; editing by Simon Jessop)