Recognize the fact that we are going into a very difficult period in terms of the slowdown in the global economy. We know how much pressure there is on ordinary families. Businesses are preparing for a pretty hard time. Even though the outlook is as concerning as that, we remain optimistic as a business that we have the strength to face this period, and we think there will be opportunities that will be available for us to take advantage of. That's why we have put up this quote from Winston Churchill. With that said, I'm going to go into the results. We've tried to characterize the results over a three-year period because we've been on a journey of disciplined strategic execution.
In March 2019, in fact, February 2019, we presented a set of objectives to the market that we wanted to pursue. As we emerge out of this COVID environment, clearly, we've had some recovery post the lockdowns, but we've also had a strong commitment by our colleagues to support our clients. As a consequence, we can see over the last three years or so, a strong recovery in performance. Nishlan will talk about the numbers later today in more detail, but I would like to confirm that our business is strong, strategically well-positioned, very clearly positioned, strong balance sheet, strong liquidity. We have an asset quality that you will see as we go through the numbers that is particularly attractive as we go forward. Our clients also have come through COVID particularly strongly.
As we go into the next period, we believe that both from a business perspective as Investec and from a client's perspective, there is an ability to navigate the period that is coming. By that, I do not mean that our clients will not be affected, nor do I mean that Investec will not be affected. We are as well-positioned going into this tough environment as we ever have been. Nishlan will go through the numbers. Secondly, we would like to give you a sense of how unique our positioning is in the market. I talked a little earlier about our strategic positioning. We do not serve the mass market like most high street banks do.
We have select client bases, and that places us in a position to be quite resilient in times like the ones we are going to. Over the last three years, we have shrunk our strategic canvas to two core geographies, the U.K. and South Africa, obviously supported by a number of geographies. We also have shrunk our business into specialist banking and wealth management. In these businesses, we have a level of specialization driven by entrepreneurial culture and driven by our absolute commitment to client centricity. That specialization has given us the ability over the last year to grow our funds under management by 9.2% to GBP 63.8 billion and our advances by 13%.
As we go forward, that level of specialization will be important because we will stay close to our clients even as times go hard. We do believe that we will have the ability to continue to support them. Thirdly, over the last three years or so, we have demonstrated the ability to generate capital to support our growth ambitions. When we presented three years ago, there was a level of doubt as to whether we would be able to generate the level of capital that would support our growth plans, first and foremost, because we were de-merging our asset management business, now Ninety One, and a lot of people thought that the banks were essentially dependent on the cash flows from the asset management business.
I'm really pleased that we've been able to generate significant capital that allowed us to support growth and importantly also to pay generous dividends. You will see in these results that we are able to declare 14p, bringing the dividend for the year to 25p. In fact, we also will be distributing at the end of this month 15% of Ninety One, bringing to our shareholders a total distribution of. What is it, Nishlan?
GBP 1.6 billion. I like to call it just under GBP 1.7 billion. In rand terms, about ZAR 32 billion. That is significant capital return to our shareholders.
If you look at the trajectory of our returns, I would like to point out specifically that given the level of capital both in the U.K. and South Africa, you'll see that our capital ratios have gone up. Specifically in South Africa, we have a level of excess capital. Our capital ratio will have printed at 14%. If we take in AIRB that we are at on parallel run with at the moment, that capital ratio gets to 16%. There is a level of optionality to return some capital to our shareholders over the next two years. When we look at the returns, being the last point that I want to talk about on this slide, we see that there has been a strong recovery in returns.
Each of our businesses is generating returns in excess of the cost of capital. We have excess capital in the middle that we have to deal with. We have an investment portfolio that we said we wanted to reduce over the last three years. We see both from the momentum of the businesses as we go forward, given the support we give to our clients and our ability to manage capital better, that we will be able to get to our medium-term targets in 2024. At the moment, we printed an ROE of 11.4%. We will hope for an improvement in the coming year, and in 2024, we hope to be well inside of that range.
You will see that with respect to cost-income ratio, we are already at 63.3% versus our medium-term target of 63%. We've made significant progress, and we have a level of confidence as we continue to execute with discipline our strategic path. Just looking at the numbers very briefly. We've had a 91% increase in adjusted earnings per share to 55.1p, slightly ahead of guidance that we had provided. We're really pleased that the driver behind this result is revenue growth. Over the last year or two, most banks have had fantastic results, but driven largely out of impairment releases. We've seen 21% growth in revenues. Second, we have had significant cost control.
Costs are up 6%, but fixed costs were contained to a growth of 1.1%. If you look at our pre-provision operating income, that is up 50%. This is a performance driven by activity with our clients, not just impairments. Obviously, we serve a select client base, and the asset quality will always be good, is good and better than our competitors through the cycle. The next number I would like to highlight, obviously, is the adjusted operating profit at GBP 687.4 million. That is 82% ahead of last year. As I said, driven by revenue growth.
What is really pleasing for these results is that of that GBP 687.4 million, GBP 300 million of that has been generated by our business in the PLC. You will know that over time, there have been some people who've doubted the capability of this business to generate substantial growth. Nishlan Samujh will report that this business in the U.K. increased earnings by 138% or so, a fantastic performance. That represents, the GBP 300 million represents about 44% of our total adjusted operating profit. The second, item I would like to highlight is that of the revenue of just under GBP 2 billion that supports this adjusted operating profit number, just over GBP 1 billion, just over half is non-interest revenue.
Both from a geography perspective, plc and Limited and from a source of revenue or kind of revenue, net interest versus non-interest revenue, we see a balanced business model that gives us the ability to go through difficult periods because of that level of diversity. Our cost-income ratio I've spoken about. The jaws are opening, increasing revenues, well-contained costs, leading to the crocodile's jaws opening a lot wider. The credit loss ratio at 8 basis points is obviously at a historical low, and that is a consequence of three things. First, we have seen very low actual impairment in the period. Second, we have seen recoveries in our South African business, and I would like to point, thirdly, that we have retained significant overlays given as we move substantially out of the lockdowns, as we said, with inflationary pressures on the outlook.
There obviously is uncertainty and downside, so we have had to retain a different character of overlay, but significantly, we have retained our overlays. Our business, as I said, is highly niche. The asset quality of our client base is particularly good. Therefore, the asset quality of our books is also good. Getting to return on equity. At 11.4% we have increased from 6.6%, so that is a pleasing increase. Look at the return on equity from our U.K. business at 11.2%. That is a fantastic return. If you look at the return on tangible equity for that business, it is at 12.9%.
You may be surprised that the return on equity of the South African business prints at 11.7%. That's a consequence, one, of the high level of capital that we had. I talked about a 16% CET1 ratio on AIRB, and I said there is a level of capital optionality to deal with a level of excess capital. Also, the tax rate for the South African business in these numbers is at about 29%. Obviously, going forward, that tax rate will normalize closer to around the twenties. Capital management and the strength of our underlying business and the momentum we have gives us the confidence that we can reach the targets that we have set.
We've generated significant value for our shareholders, as evidenced in this particular reporting period, by a double-digit growth in net asset value per share to 510p. On the back of that, as I said, we are pleased to have declared a dividend in the second period of 14p, taking us to 25p and a payout ratio of 45% at the upper end of our 30%-50% guided payout ratio. I've spoken about the special distribution of 15% of Ninety One. It's been good times in terms of returns for our shareholders, and hopefully, Nishlan, Richard, and the team can do a lot more in terms of dealing with the excess capital in the South African business to increase the returns to our shareholders. We run the business for the long term.
While the profit numbers look impressive, our purpose is to create enduring worth for our clients, for our colleagues, for the communities in which we operate, and obviously we want to do so in a manner that protects the environment. We have ingrained and made sustainability a core element of our business as opposed to a separate consideration. Whether it be in the lending that we do or in the investing that we do. I will not go through the different measurement points that we have on this slide. I am really pleased that we continue to live true to living in society and not of it. Now, I'm gonna ask Nishlan to go through the numbers. I gave you a high-level view of the results. Nishlan, it's all up to you now.
Thanks, Fani, and good morning to everyone. It's really a privilege to be up here to present to all of you. I think if I get into the results, let's not forget that the context of March 2022 is actually an improving context, with a strong recovery from a COVID environment in both geographies in which we operated in. I think if we look forward, you know, the South African GDP, at the end of this period was still about 1.8% behind where it was from a pre-COVID environment, and there is still economic pressure overall. From a U.K. perspective, I think we've seen an impressive recovery from a pre-COVID environment.
from a COVID environment over this period, and we understand that there are pressures as we experience and work through the impact of the Ukraine war, as we work through the impact of inflationary pressure, and as we work through the actions that are taken across the globe by the various regulatory bodies. Again, supportive markets over the period. Now, we did see some pullback at the end of March. To some extent, the funds that we would have reported at the end of December are a little lower, but still strongly above where we were in the prior year. Similarly, exchange rates have also strengthened over the period, so the contribution from the rand earnings from South Africa, more material in terms of the GBP conversion. Global interest rates have been on the up.
I think we're all watching the steepness of those curves. I think just a point to note is that particularly in South Africa, we are still not at the 2019 interest rate levels. We anticipate that the increases in interest rates anticipated over this next while will get us to those levels, not materially above those levels. From a U.K. perspective, obviously, we are a bit higher, but again, not at all-time highs. I think the key point for us is that from a client perspective, we have operated through cycles which clients have experienced higher interest rates. Let's simply unpack the earnings per share over this period. Again, we have compared to March 2019, and the relevance of that period is it's a pre-COVID period.
It's a period in which we did not have the drag from the financial product losses that we experienced in March 2020 and March 2021 as well. One of the points that I will raise is we operated with an effective tax rate in March 2019 of 9.5%. That effective tax rate is now effectively normalized towards 22%, albeit different in our geographies, where it's a bit lower in the U.K. from a normalized rate and higher in South Africa from a normalized rate. What we've attempted to do on this chart is also to highlight the contribution from our 25% interest that we hold in Ninety One. As you're aware, about two-thirds of that contribution is being distributed to shareholders. That is anticipated to rebase as we later.
Looking at the underlying contribution, you know, 82% growth in operating profit from GBP 377.6 million to GBP 687.4 million. A point to stress is that the pre-provision adjusted operating profit increased by 50.1%, in the period to GBP 716.2 million. Yes, there are lower impairment charges in this period. As we've reiterated, some of the balance sheet protection that has built up over the period remains on balance sheet. There is a very fundamental story around revenue. Yes, if you look at the U.K. Bank, there's about GBP 87 million delta with regard to the financial product losses that we experienced last year against the current year.
The underlying growth of GBP 332 million, you'll see, has strongly come through in the net interest income line, representing the fundamental growth and focus on client acquisition in that market. Broadly speaking, if we look at the two big areas, the South African and the U.K. business, strength being reflected within those particular markets that we operate in. If we look across the businesses, so whether that is the banking businesses or the wealth businesses or the investment portfolio that we hold across the group, all of these have positively contributed across this period. I'll unpack each of those as we go, get into the details just now. At a high level, our wealth business in the U.K. has achieved record FUM at GBP 44 billion.
Growing from GBP 41.7 billion with net inflows of GBP 1.2 billion over the period. We have disclosed that some of that net inflows over the period has arisen from our integrated approach across our private client businesses. About GBP 437 million of the GBP 1.2 billion represents funds under management gathered from that particular portfolio within this period. Adjusted operating profit up by 17.9% to GBP 87.7 million. The wealth business in South Africa achieved overall growth in funds under management of just over GBP 13 billion, of which GBP 12.1 billion was discretionary.
A large contribution coming from that, and effectively record levels of new funds under management gathered in the period. We'll unpack the reasons, but a strong performance with a 30% increase in operating profit to GBP 720 million. The Specialist Bank in the U.K., I think the core aspect around this is our private client strategies as well as our strategies across the corporate book. While we did have lower M&A activity over the period, you still saw strong growth in underlying revenue, underpinned by loan book growth of 17% over the period, and the overall loan book growing to GBP 14.4 billion, and adjusted operating profits substantially higher year-over-year.
The South African Specialist Bank operated in an environment where there is still subdued business confidence, and in that context has grown the loan book by about 4%. Significant portion of that coming from our private client lending books and our corporate books to the extent that we did experience loan growth over the period, there was also higher repayments, resulting in a much lower contribution to overall growth levels in the period. Adjusted operating profit in that context grew by 45% to ZAR 7.1 billion. Our group investments portfolio is valued at just over GBP 1 billion at this point in time, of which around about a third of that is being distributed to shareholders.
Coming back to the point that Fani raised earlier, I think if we look at the mix from a geographic perspective, the U.K. generates around about 55% of the revenue for the group and just under 45% of the operating profit for the group. South Africa contributing 56% to the operating profit of the group. From a business perspective, 72% of our revenue coming from the Specialist Bank, and you will see when we report annuity income that we report around about 76% annuity income for the group. There's a high component as well within the Specialist Bank that we see as recurring income, with 23% coming from our wealth businesses and around about a 5% contribution from the group investments portfolio. Now the
Just some detail in our wealth business in South Africa. Funds under management at ZAR 365 billion, growing from ZAR 333 billion, or in other words, 9.5% increase since March 2021. Again, I'm stressing that you had around about 6.9% growth in discretionary FUM over the period, with net inflows of just over ZAR 12 billion over the period. Now, market volatility and some of the pullback that we saw in the last quarter, obviously dampening these growth levels to what we would have seen up to the third quarter of the year.
Notwithstanding any of those pressures, operating profit growing by 30%, fundamentally underpinned by sustained inflows into our offshore product range, which is a unique offering from a South African perspective, particularly taking the entire business that we have to offer to our international client base in South Africa as well. We have gathered higher average annuity and discretionary FUM, which effectively again provides a very strong underpin to the business. In this period, we had increased brokerage from increased trading activity undertaken by clients. The operating margin at 33.2% compares very strongly against the market and if not a leading level in the market. Now, in that context, operating costs have increased by 17.9%, which is much higher than the average as I will indicate from a group perspective.
Some of that is variable, so it's associated with the increased operating profit, but there remains sustained investment with regard to investment specialists, wealth managers, and IT. If I move over to the wealth business in the U.K. here, as I've indicated, funding increasing by 6.6% to GBP 44.4 billion, similar to South Africa, impact of the quarter end markets and moving into the new quarter. Net organic growth of about 2.9% with inflows of GBP 1.2 billion over the period. We achieved an operating margin for the U.K. domestic business of about 27%. Operating costs in this business increased by 5.8% with continued investment in technology.
Obviously, variable remuneration associated with the increase in operating profit by 17.9% to GBP 87.7 million. As we've seen across the group, continued sustained widening of the jaws. The South African specialist bank, I think we've seen strong deposit growth, and we continue to focus on the diversification of our deposit base as well as the cost of that deposit base. You will see when I get to net interest income that the operating margin, the net interest margin improved from about 184 basis points to about 207 basis points. A significant improvement in the margin. That comes from twofold.
One is the growth in the book, and the other is really the reduction in the cost of deposits and sustained credit margins across our lending portfolios. That brings me to a split of the earnings base, where you see that net interest income in the South African business grew by 13.2%. Again, I'll stress, driven by reduced funding costs and overall average increase in loan books year-over-year. Net fees was supported by higher lending activity and higher turnover in the business as well as higher transactional volume from our private client base. I think we've grown that private client base by just over 7% over the period. Trading income supported by increased client activity across the base, and that was a strong performance over this period.
The cost-income ratio improved to 51.1%, with operating income increasing by 18.7%. Fixed costs were well managed, with overall increases well below inflation in the South African market. We've seen that for a sustained period over three years, with fixed costs increasing by just over 4.2% and operating costs in total increasing by 8.9%, but a strong widening again of the jaws in that particular market. Overall, adjusted operating profit increasing by 45% to ZAR 7.1 billion. From the Specialist Bank business in the U.K., I think fundamentally strong growth in the underlying core loans and advances from GBP 12.3 billion to GBP 14.4 billion, and that is a significant component of the overall group's core loans and advances of GBP 29.9 billion pounds.
That growth of 17% is around about 18.5% if we adjust for the fact that we have disposed of a component in the Australian portfolio a year ago. Our private client lending is up around about 35.1%. That is fundamentally driven by the strategy that we introduced to the market in February 2019 and focused on our high-net-worth client base that we continue to build. It's an area of focus in terms of integration with our overall wealth business as well. Demand for corporate credit lending was strong over the period across several portfolios, and again, I'll unpack that for you a little later, but growing by about 12% if I adjust for Australia.
Again, deposits effectively being managed on a basis of achieving better overall cost of funds in the period. Again, when we get to unpack the revenue lines, you can see that net interest income increased by 20.9% over the period. Ruth, I forget the net interest margin, but I think it's about 2.14%, somewhere around there. 2.16%. It's the immaterial costs related to what we previously reported as structured product book. It's an area that we're not really focusing on in these results because it has been well managed. The risk is significantly lower from where we have been. While we've been in choppy markets, the overall cost for this period has been relatively immaterial.
There have been lower net fees, and part of that is associated with the wind down of Australia, as well as a reduction in equity market activity off a high base in the prior year. If we look at the cost-income ratio, significantly improving from 81.3% to 69.6%, over the period, underpinned by strong growth in operating income and costs being managed effectively, relatively flat. In that context, again, you have had a higher variable remuneration. You see continued effects of the restructure that we initiated in the prior year, having a material impact in bringing in the cost-income ratio for the underlying business. Adjusted operating profit increasing by 332% to just under GBP 194 million. Group investments. It is now a simple portfolio.
When we refer to it, there are effectively four lines of which three are the most material, and that's our 25% interest in Ninety One. Our investment in Investec Property Fund, which reported strong results yesterday. Our investment in IEP, where we have seen an improvement in our income yield to about 5.2% over the period. The overall return on equity on this portfolio is at about 9.8%. As I've indicated, the most material impact that you will see over the next while is the reduction in our holding in Ninety One. Now, bringing the picture back together, and this, again, is a reference to overall Investec.
I think with overall operating income at GBP 1.99 billion, we can't wait to get over that GBP 2 billion mark. You can see again the contribution coming from net interest income, which we've unpacked on both of our specialist bank businesses. Net fees and commissions really been underpinned by our wealth and our banking businesses with some lower contribution from M&A activity. Investment income really driven by the underlying assets that I've identified, and trading income at a reduction of the impact of the financial products underpinned by strong activity across our trading activity across the businesses. That really gives you a feel focusing on the fact that annuity income at around about 76.2% over the period is reasonably in line with where we have been.
Operating costs. I think I've given you a lot of detail on it. I think just a couple of snippets is that, while our operating costs are up by 6%, fixed costs are up by 1.1% over the period. Within that context, I think our overall, technology spending, including people costs, is about just over GBP 230-odd million , of which about half of that is really reinvestment into new technology from a group perspective. Technology spend growing by about 4%, so ahead of our underlying fixed cost base. We did benefit from the fact that we did not have a repeat of some of the one-off restructuring costs that we incurred in the prior year.
I think again, when Fani summarizes at the end, you will see that fixed costs are significantly maintained or if not lower than where we started, back in 2019. From an earnings driver perspective, I think a strong contribution across the portfolio, and I know that sometimes we look at these in the singular geographies that we are in, but as a combined basis, again, the group's sustaining strong growth of just over 13.2% in core loans to GBP 29.9 billion and fund growing by 9.2% to GBP 63.8 billion over this period. Now, if we look at the loan books, I'm gonna go through this relatively quickly because there's a lot of detail in the booklets for you.
Again, just to provide some color to the book, you will see in South Africa that we had decent growth in our mortgage book, in our high net worth and specialized lending areas, offset by lower books in certain areas of our corporate lending book. Some of that influenced by repayments over the period. From a U.K. perspective, yes, we did have strong growth in our mortgage book, but that is off a lower base and growing to about just over GBP 4.15 billion over this period. Again, lending collateralized by property, high net worth and specialized lending, as well as asset finance and corporate and acquisition finance, experiencing strong loan growth over this period.
The majority of this is underpinned by client acquisition and targeted client acquisition. From an ECL perspective, you saw us build our provisions, particularly over March 2020. The majority of those provisions that were raised were effectively an outlook from an outlook perspective, so driven by our models and driven by us raising overlays. Over this period, if I go across the periods, we continue to experience low levels of specific write-offs across the portfolios. The asset quality remaining relatively intact over the period. Now, you will see some migration between the staging, but moving towards a better asset quality than what we experienced at the end of March 2021.
While you see very low charges over the period, some of those impairments that have been built up are effectively carried on balance sheet for different risks than existed in those particular periods. Our credit loss ratio at about 8 basis points. You know, I think again, guidance that we're providing, we have reduced our guidance from about 30-40 basis points to 25-35 basis points, and that's based on the history that we've built up over a number of years across the two geographies.
Now if I really unpack this into the geographies, in South Africa, we experience a credit loss ratio of close to 0%. There were higher recoveries as we experienced in the prior year as well, and we did release some of our overlays, reducing our overall overlay from about GBP 290 million to GBP 219 million over this period. You know, again, limited default experience. As we stand here right now, that experience remains similar. The outlook points to the fact that we do anticipate a level of normalization to our guided loan loss ratio of about 20-30 basis points for this particular book. From a U.K. perspective, we did have one or two specific impairments in the period. We did
While the overlays are actually higher than where they were at March 2021, they are slightly lower than what we did have at the midterm this year. Overall, lower experienced impairments and lower propensity for new impairments, albeit that with a loan book growth of around about 17% there are new impairments that arise on day one with those books in our models. If we look at our balance sheet provisions, overall, I would say balance sheet provisions relatively comparable year-on-year. There are some recoveries that will reduce overall provisions, but coverage ratios remaining relatively in line with where we've seen them, and again, comparable from a market perspective, taking into consideration the higher level of collateralization that exists in our books.
We have seen some migration between stage three and stage two over the period. Slightly different experience in both geographies. Now coming to ROE. I think Fani has touched on the essence of ROE from a South African perspective at 11.7% in the context of a 16% CET1 ratio. From a U.K. perspective, a 12.9% return on tangible equity really representing the level of capital that's also invested in our wealth businesses. From a geographic split perspective, the overall capital base is pretty evenly deployed between South Africa and the U.K.
You know, some of the nuances in these results is that you do have a higher tax rate in South Africa, a little lower tax rate in the U.K., which really one would have to adjust for in forward-looking models. At the end of the day, the level of not just surplus capital, but excess capital that sits in the South African business. We are fairly confident, given the fact that the underlying businesses are operating well above or within the cost of capital.
Maybe a final point that I would make on capital is when you do look in our detailed books, we reflect the return on equity for our businesses on the basis that each of those businesses are operating with that surplus and excess capital across both geographies. It's on a fully absorbed basis. The CET1 ratio from a PLC perspective has improved from 11.2% to 11.7%. I have to reiterate that is on a standardized basis, so when you do compare to market, note that. The second differential for us between us and the market is the fact that we are not a GSIB bank, so we do not have the levels of buffers that are required for GSIB banks.
Our underlying regulatory minimum ratios are much lower than what you would see for the high street banks. Operating with a leverage ratio of 9.2%, and that is now a standardized industry calculation that we reflect. From a limited perspective, our CET1 ratio is at 14%, and overall capital ratio at 17.5%. As we've indicated under our full adoption of AIRB, both of those ratios are about 2% higher than these. We do anticipate moving the remaining portfolios within this financial year. Coming back to our targets that we've set for the group, I think this is purely a scorecard. I'm not gonna read through it. Reiterating the point that we remain committed to those underlying targets.
I think it's time now to hand over to Fani to wrap up. Oh, before I get to you, Fani. Sorry.
Oh, Nish.
I forgot about my last slide, which is the financial outlook. Maybe the headings say it all. We are very mindful of the uncertain environment that is out there, and very mindful of the potential slowdowns in economies and maybe some other effects that will come through. Again, we emphasize that the business is well-positioned. We emphasize that we do have strength to take opportunities and to look at optionality around capital. I think if we bring together you know just a forward look, revenue outlook is underpinned by the fact that we have got rising interest rates, which is positive from a an underlying earnings perspective. Book growth as well as increasing activity levels. We get
We expect our cost-income ratios to come well below our target of 63%. Our normalized guidance of impairments is a counter to some of those benefits that we've highlighted, and the fact that a distribution which places some of Ninety One in your hands means that we take it out of the earnings that we have. I think as you look at ROE, be conscious of the capital levels that we operate at. Yes, we do anticipate an improving return on equity in the next financial year, but really see ourselves getting into our targets in the FY 2024 year. Now, Fani, definitely over to you.
Okay, Nish, let me take it home. Nishlan has obviously gone through a level of detail. He's taken twice the time that I took to open up, so I'm gonna try take it home much quicker. As I said at the beginning, we've been on a particular strategic journey from a business that was quite wide in terms of its coverage, and we have shrunk for better profitability, better relevance, and better scale in the geographies where we operate. That journey has been interesting. As I said earlier on, we have after the demerger now we are distributing further our holding in Ninety One. We've exited Australia, Hong Kong, and a few other areas. In that process, we have refined our risk appetite and granularized our loan book.
As we go forward, we would expect a much more lower-risk business, but with a level of client engagement that is higher off the base of the franchises that we have. The work to simplify has come to a good end as we go. As part of it, our businesses are focused quite sharply on serving the clients that we have chosen to serve. Because we do not have the bulk of the bulk bracket businesses where we choose to compete, we really have to be exceptional. We take on people that are entrepreneurial. We have a mindset of agility, which obviously is helpful in an environment where we are going into. We've always been totally fascinated by the idea of being client-centric.
One of the planks as we go forward is that we will look to serve our clients much more holistically. As an example, the private bank served their clients with a high level of focus, in terms of solutions, but also in terms of service levels. There was not, at the same time, a level of coordination between the private bank and the wealth business. While those specializations will continue, we will look to integrate those much better for better effect for our clients and also for better returns for the business. Equally operationally, we will look to invest more into our platforms to serve the business holistically, increasing operating leverage and increasing the experience of our clients. Nishlan spoke about our investment into technology.
As we move forward, we expect our technology spend to be a lot more oriented towards the transformation of the business to support growth. This is where the idea of being highly focused is really important to us. Of the original goals that we set, we still need to trim our investment portfolio in South Africa, and we obviously have, as Nishlan said, to deal with the level of excess capital. The focus as we move forward is more on growing our businesses. We talk of client acquisition in the areas where we have chosen to play.
South Africa, for instance, there's a lot of work we're doing in the private client space, both at the top end of the market and at what we would call the bottom end of the market, which is still a high level of client as opposed to a high street client. Lots of work there we are doing. We're doing a lot of work in the mid-market space in South Africa and in the U.K. Similarly, in the U.K, we have quite a significant level of client acquisition. Three years ago, we said that by this time, we will get to about 6,500 of these high-net-worth clients. We are now at about 6,900 or so.
We remain confident that we will reach our targets and that the cooperation and collaboration between bank and wealth will deepen and increase. Nishlan talked about some of the referrals from the bank in this period, about GBP 480 million or so of AUM. We are very excited about that opportunity. We also will look to work much more closely between our private clients business in South Africa and our private clients business in the U.K. While it's said that an emerging market like South Africa loses both skills and capital, we obviously have to work with that environment. Our business is strategically positioned to support our clients as they either emigrate physically or financially. We are well-positioned at the top end of the market.
There are a number of these growth opportunities that we are focusing on. Hopefully in November, we can talk a bit more about it now that the simplify and focus element of our strategy is largely in place. Growth becomes the area that we look at. Obviously, the outlook, as Nishlan laid out, is a bit more challenging. But our specialization and our client centricity and our culture of entrepreneurship and agility does counteract the bulk of that negativity. Of course, we live in the neighborhood, and we will be affected as such. Just taking stock, Nishlan, I have to look a bit harder now. I'm not as young as Nishlan. That's why I had my iPad earlier on. Over these years, we've obviously said we will substantially resize our operating platform.
As an example, if you look at our cost of operation, in particular in Ruth's business, you will find that over the last four years or so, we've largely had the same level of cost base, despite the fact that we are growing our business quite substantially. I mean, we've said, for instance, in this period that our fixed costs are up only 1.1%. That discipline continues as we go forward. In fact, between the bank in the U.K. and the bank in S.A., we think there are certain benefits we can gain by doing certain things together. The drive for more efficiency will continue. We had also said at the time that we will look to refine our risk appetite.
I've spoken a bit about it, and you will see that in the impairment profile as we go forward. We also had committed at that time that we will not be issuing shares into the market, diluting shareholders. You are beginning to see the WANOS start to reduce. Weighted average number of outstanding shares start to reduce. As I said, there is a level of excess capital that we have to deal with, and I'm not saying how we're gonna do it, but we have to do it. You will see a number of these metrics continuing to improve. We generate, as I said, significant levels of capital, and you can see ordinary shareholders' equity increase over the period. Nishlan has spoken about the ROE and the capital level.
We are excited about where the business is positioned as we look forward. Nishlan, I'm not gonna take 30 minutes. I'm trying to run through. I won't go through this slide, but it very neatly re-emphasizes our strategic positioning in the two geographies and in the businesses that we have chosen to pursue. A level of scale would be represented by this particular slide. It's in the presentation pack. I won't go through it. Again, over the last three years or so, we had said we will pursue growth, and we'll talk a bit more about this in our November results. We had said we will significantly manage our cost base. We had said we will allocate our capital with a level of discipline. We've made significant progress, but there is still more that we need to do there.
As we move forward, Lyndon, who heads our technology and digitalization efforts, has a lot more work to do because as a specialized bank, technology can help us overcome some of the disadvantages that we have. For instance, with respect to deposit taking, because we don't have branches. With respect to operations. As an example, one of the strategies that we are pursuing is that of partnering with fintech. As opposed to us spending lots of money trying to develop certain of our platforms, we can go into a plug-and-play kind of arrangement. As an example, we have a strategic partnership with Monese in certain areas of our business. This area is quite important for us.
Connectivity refers to building of a client ecosystem and an operating platform, that services our clients. These disciplines will continue as we move forward. Finally, in conclusion, Nishlan, I'm not trying to take as much time as you did. We are a specialized business. We have over 45 years of a very rich heritage in the two businesses that we have spoken about. Private banking, as part of the specialist bank. Private banking, corporate banking, investment banking. We have a number of specializations within that, like, property management, for instance. We really, where we operate, within wealth management, again, are specialists and have the scale. As I said, there are opportunities between our two geographies.
There are opportunities between private banking and wealth with us giving our clients a much more integrated private client offering. We continue to be fundamentally dedicated to our purpose of making a positive impact to our clients, to our colleagues, to the societies in which we operate, and to the environment. That remains core to us. In everything we do, we are guided by that North Star. In these tough times, as we go forward, we will support our clients as they may get impacted by the environment. We've supported our clients during COVID, supported our colleagues during COVID. Of course, as we go into this environment where, as an example, as we exit COVID, we have to work differently.
We will continue to support our colleagues and support our culture. As I said, we have scale in the businesses we have chosen to be in, and we will continue to be selective as to who we serve, who we can be relevant to, who we can be competitive in servicing. We are not all things to all people. Very clearly. We have strong levels of capital, strong levels of liquidity. The asset quality is fantastic, and we have clearly identified ambitions for growth as we go over the next little while. The environment and the outlook is cloudy, but we are confident in the quality of our clients, how strong they have emerged from the challenges of COVID, the strength of our culture, and the fundamental strength of our business.
We hope to continue to deliver shareholder value like we have done over the little while. Thank you very much. We are ready for questions. Thank you. I understand. Thank you very much. I understand we'll take questions from here in the room and then go to Johannesburg, then go to the Chorus Call line and then people that are joining us online. Let's start here. Sometimes silence is good, sometimes it is not. Going, going, gone. Okay, we'll come back here. Let's go to Johannesburg. Have we got our colleagues in Johannesburg? Any question from Johannesburg? My predecessor, Stephen, said to me once, "If there's no question, take it and move on." Because sometimes I continue to coax people into asking questions. Okay, no questions in Johannesburg.
Fani, there's no question.
Any question on Chorus Call? Sorry?
Fani, I was just confirming there's no questions coming through from Johannesburg.
Oh, thank you. Thank you very much. Any questions from the online,
Yeah. There's just one question.
Yeah
From Kunal Kalyan. He says, "It is great to see significant improvement in sustainability disclosure. How does the group plan on furthering its contribution towards driving ESG forward in S.A?
Look, we've been a leader in ESG in South Africa. Our policy, for instance, on fossil fuels and on coal is on our website. We clearly have to go to Scope 3 analysis of our overall impact and the impact of our clients, and we continue to work on that. We've over the last 45 years, even before sustainability and ESG was invoked. We've always said we are long-term in our outlook on our impact on our client and on society. That's why we have the phrase, for 45 years, we live in society and not of it. In our lending, we continue to deeply embed considerations of sustainability.
In our investing, we are doing so more and more, and we continue to subscribe to more and more stringent standards as we go. I must be quite clear, though, that we are quite conscious of the need for a just transition. As an example, in South Africa, while in general we will not support export coal. Coal that goes into Eskom, that supplies 95% of our electricity, that we continue to support in terms of what we do with Eskom. Those who are exposed to South Africa know that on a daily basis, not on a daily basis, but on a number of days, probably about a third of the year, you will have some level of load shedding.
While we are highly committed to making sure that we support the efforts to clean up, we also have to support the social side of that country in providing electricity to the population. Yeah, something that we've done for quite a long time. Excited about it. Some will know that I serve on the Global Investors for Sustainable Development Alliance that was put together by the United Nations, the Secretary General. We continue to advocate for more sustainable lending and investing and for mobilizing capital for sustainability. We are excited about it at Investec, excited about it at a personal level. If you come from a country like ours, you know what impact sustainability can make.
Of course, even in a country as developed as the U.K, you do know what impact sustainability can make.
Fani, we have one more question. It's from Rajay Ambekar from Excelsia Capital .
Nishlan Samujh, this is probably yours, but, let's see.
Please could you outline possible plans for the remaining Ninety One stake?
All right. I think we said in 2019, 2020, as we moved towards distributing what we held of Ninety One, we had wanted to sell 10% of Ninety One at the time, and I see Ed Squires is here, who was advising us on the demerger at the time. The markets were not supportive then. We decided not to sell at those levels. Our strategic position on it was that we would like to have capital optionality in the U.K. for a period, and then we will decide what we do with the remaining 10%. As I said, we have returned about just under GBP 1.7 billion or so of Ninety One taking the price at March 16th, I think. I think we've done well by our shareholders.
We will retain the optionality on that stake, and if anything changes, we will let you know.
I think that's it, Fani Titi. No more questions.
Okay, we're back to London. Despite Stephen's advice to me, I will offer an opportunity for one last question. Well, there's no question in the room. Thank you for your attendance. As you can see, we think the work that we have been doing has borne some fruit. We are excited about our positioning in the market. We are fanatical about our clients and our ability to support them. As we move forward in this tough environment, we are grateful that our business is strong, both in terms of capital, liquidity, asset quality, culture, despite the disruption that we've had from COVID, and we remain fundamentally hungry for more progress and more growth. Thank you very much.