Legal &General Group Plc said its retirement division is on track todouble new business sales in 2016, with sales already at £5.4 billion, comparedto £2.9 billion at 2015-end.

Since June-end, the retirement business has written morethan £1.4 billion in sales, comprising £1.2 billion for pension de-risking,£130 million of lifetime mortgages and £90 million of individual annuities.

The group said customer demand at its retirement businesshas not been impacted by the introduction of the Solvency II regime in 2016,the uncertainty surrounding the Brexit vote and the continuing low interestrate environment.

L&G said it has written more than £400 million in bulkannuity business in the U.K. and the U.S. during September alone. Lifetimemortgages are expected to exceed £500 million of sales in 2016.

The group said it has started to invest in U.S.infrastructure assets to support its growing U.S. pensions de-risking business.About £6.2 billion of the group's annuity portfolio is invested ininfrastructure assets, of which nearly £1 billion has been invested in 2016.