Partners Life chief financial officer Sean Kam says the result is not a worry for the company as net revenue, including reinsurance payments, grew to $85.16 million in the most recent financial year, from $78.56 million in the 2013 year. But total expenses grew from $69.87 million to $80.99 million.

Kam said the difference in profit from the year could be put down to changes in the discounting rate and reserving basis, which accounted for $1.8 million of the difference. He said last year’s profit was driven by interest rates. “These are not in our control.”

Kam said the 2014 year was a successful one for Partners. Premium revenue grew from $38.4 million to $68.7 million and the in-force book grew to $92.7 million. It passed $100 million in July.

He said profit was not the company’s most important measure of performance. It was more interested in market share, adviser relationships, in-force premiums and premium revenues. “Those are the metrics that we measure ourselves by as a new company.”

Partners had a solvency margin of $7.2 million, he said, and the biggest share of the independent adviser market.

“Our adviser relationships are very strong… we have strong relationships with dealer groups and individual advisers. The feedback from our recent adviser conferences is that everyone is happy.”

The company completed a capital raising earlier this year, generating $31 million.