Legal & General has doubled its target for lifetime mortgages and now expect to write around £200m of lifetime mortgages new business this year and increasing amounts thereafter.

This follows its entry into the lifetime mortgage market during the last financial year.

It reporting an 18% increase in operating profits for the first half of the year to £750m.

L&G expects individual annuities sales to remain subdued, saying that the market remains challenging both in respect of the Budget reforms and in light of regulatory change.

Nigel Wilson, group chief executive, said: “Legal & General continues to deliver strong organic growth in the UK and the US from both our developing and established, market leading businesses. In addition we are disposing of, or closing non-core businesses and reducing costs in real and nominal terms.

“The actions that we are taking allow us to focus on our chosen markets, enable us to continue to deliver low prices and better value for our increasing customer base and deliver attractive returns for our shareholders.

“This financial and strategic discipline is driving our sixth year of double digit growth in net cash, operating profit and dividends – particularly noteworthy in H1 was the diversity of the strong operational and financial delivery, with an 18% increase in operating profit to £750m, the 19% increase in dividend per share to 3.45p and the 19% ROE.”