This included strong client flows with more than $16 billion of inflows in Wealth Management and Asset Management in the quarter, and we ended with assets under management and administration of 28% to $1.2 trillion, another new high.
This further advances our mix shift to capital-light businesses and frees up approximately $700 million of excess capital.
Momentum in the business continues with revenues coming in strongly at $3.4 billion or 22% fueled by organic growth in markets.
Earnings increased 34% excluding the reversal of the NOL a year ago with earnings per share up 39% reflecting strong business growth and capital return and ROE remains exceptionally strong at 37.5%.
Total client inflows were up 54% to $9.5 billion and that continue the positive trends we are seeing over the past several quarters.
Consistent with strong client flows, wrap net inflows were $10 billion continuing a very strong run rate.
Transactional activity also grew nicely, up nearly 30% over last year with good volume across a range of product solutions.
All of this momentum along with positive markets drove nice growth in advisor productivity up 14% adjusting for interest rates to a record of 731,000 per advisor.
On the recruiting front, we had 42 experienced advisors join us in the quarter, a bit below where we've been.
Turning to the bank, total assets grew to $9.7 billion in the quarter, we continue to move additional deposits to the bank, and we have adjusted our investment strategy to extend duration a bit.
Margin increased 380 basis points year-over-year and in the quarter at 21.4% showing consistent expansion since the Fed cut short-term rates a year ago.
With regard to annuities, we had strong variable annuity sales with total sales up 88% from a year ago.
Assets under management rose to $593 billion, up 25% over last year from strong business results and positive markets.
Regarding investment performance, the team continues to generate excellent performance for clients across equity, fixed income, and asset allocation strategies with more than 80% of funds above median over the longer-term time frames on asset weighted basis.
This quarter, we had net inflows of $6.7 billion, an improvement of $4.1 billion from a year ago.
Excluding legacy insurance partner outflows, net inflows were $8.1 billion.
Global retail net inflows were $4.2 billion, driven by another quarter of strong results in North America.
Sales and flows traction is broad based with 15 of our investment capabilities generating over $100 million of net inflows in the quarter and in EMEA, retail sales have been weaker given the risk off environment.
In terms of Global Institutional, we saw a nice improvement with net inflows of $3.9 billion ex legacy partner outflows with wins across equity and fixed income strategies in both North America and EMEA.
In fact, the approximately $700 million of our reinsurance deal largely pays for the BMO acquisition giving us additional flexibility to return capital to shareholders at an attractive rate.
Ameriprise delivered very strong financial results across the firm with adjusted operating earnings per share up 39% to $5.27.
Additionally, we entered into an agreement to reinsure approximately $8 billion of fixed annuities and closed on the RiverSource Life transaction in early July.
As noted, we will free up approximately $700 million of capital, and we will have a marginal projected impact on fixed annuity profitability.
We returned 92% of adjusted op earnings to shareholders in the quarter, aligning us to our projected 90% target for the full year.
In the quarter, Ameriprise's adjusted operating net revenues grew 22% and PTI increased 35%, reflecting continued excellent business performance.
Revenue and earnings in our capital-light businesses of AWM and asset management drove nearly 80% of the total, excluding corporate and other, a significant shift from a year ago even normalizing for the unusually high earnings in RPS last year.
G&A expenses were well managed, up 6% given the strong business growth in the quarter.
Advice and Wealth Management delivered another quarter of excellent organic growth with total client assets up 28% to $807 billion.
Total client flows were $9.5 billion, the third consecutive quarter of total client flows at or above $9 billion, demonstrating the sustainability of our organic growth.
In the quarter, our pre-tax adjusted operating margin was 21.4%, an increase of 380 basis points from the prior year and an increase of 70 basis points sequentially despite continued low interest rates.
On page 8, financial results in Advice and Wealth Management were very strong with pre-tax adjusted operating earnings of $423 million, up 56%.
Adjusted operating net revenues grew 29% to 2 billion, fueled by robust client flows and a 29% increase in transactional activity in addition to strong market appreciation.
On a sequential basis, revenue increased nicely to 5%.
Ameriprise Bank continues to grow at a solid pace reaching nearly $10 billion in the quarter after adding $700 million of sweep cash to the balance sheet.
G&A expense increased 3%, reflecting increased activity and the timing of performance-based compensation expense.
Turning to page 9, Asset Management delivered another strong quarter, driven by excellent investment performance and sustained inflows, resulting in an outstanding financial results.
Net inflows were 8.1 billion, excluding legacy insurance partners, which is a continuation of an improved solid flow trends.
Adjusted operating revenues increased 32% to $879 million, a result of the cumulative benefit of net inflows and market appreciation.
On a sequential basis, revenues were up 6%.
Our fee rate remained strong at 52 basis points reflecting the strong momentum we are seeing across the board with strength in both equity and fixed income strategies.
G&A expenses grew 12%, primarily from the timing of compensation expense related to strong business performance as well as foreign exchange translation and higher volume related expenses.
Pre-tax adjusted operating earnings grew 79%, and we delivered a 45% margin.
Moving forward, we expect strong financial performance to continue and anticipate that margins will remain in the mid 40% range over the near term driven by current robust equity markets.
Let's turn to page 10, retirement and protection solutions continue to perform in line with expectation in this environment.
Pre-tax adjusted operating earnings were $182 million.
Retirement sales increased 88% during the quarter with two-thirds of the sales and products without living benefits.
This has shifted in the overall book and now only 62% of our block has living benefit riders, down over 200 basis points from a year ago.
Our balance sheet fundamentals remain extremely strong, including our liquidity position of $3 billion at the parent company and substantial excess capital of $2 billion, which does not include the capital release from the recently announced fixed annuity transaction.
Adjusted operating return on equity in the quarter remained strong at 37.5%.
We returned $585 million to shareholders in the quarter through dividends and buyback, and we are on track with our commitment to return 90% of adjusted operating earnings to shareholders for the year.

Summary:
This included strong client flows with more than $16 billion of inflows in Wealth Management and Asset Management in the quarter, and we ended with assets under management and administration of 28% to $1.2 trillion, another new high.
Ameriprise delivered very strong financial results across the firm with adjusted operating earnings per share up 39% to $5.27.