Hello, and welcome to the annual meeting of shareholders of GATX Corporation. During the meeting, we'll have a question-and-answer session. You can submit questions or comments at any time by clicking on the Q&A icon. It is now my pleasure to turn today's meeting over to James Ream, board chair of GATX Corporation. Mr. Ream, the floor is yours.
Good morning. My name is Jim Ream, and I am the independent Chair of the Board of Directors of GATX Corporation. Welcome to our 2024 Annual Meeting of Shareholders. We are conducting this meeting solely in a virtual format as a live webcast. Links to the proxy statement and our 2023 annual report to the shareholders are provided under that documents folder, and click on that, and then you'll see a link titled Meeting and Materials. Click on that to get to those materials. We hope that this virtual meeting will maximize the participation of our shareholders, regardless of their location. Bob Lyons, our Chief Executive Officer and a member of our Board, is in attendance, and he will make some marked remarks later in the meeting.
In addition to Bob and myself, joining today's meeting are the other independent members of our board, Diane M. Aigotti, Anne L. Arvia, Shelley J. Bausch, John M. Holmes, Adam L. Stanley, David S. Sutherland, and Paul G. Yovovich. I would like to take just a few moments to recognize Stephen R. Wilson, a former member of our board, who did not stand for reelection this year in accordance with the retirement policy for our directors. Steve made valuable contributions over his nine-year tenure as a GATX director, and all of us will miss his insight and counsel. And for everybody at GATX who had the pleasure of working with Steve, we wish him the very best. Also in attendance today is Dan Hoffenkamp and Blake Veldhuis, representatives from our independent registered accountants, Ernst & Young, and from Computershare, the Inspector of Election, Abby Cowart.
Now, I'd like to turn the meeting over to Brian Glassberg, our General Counsel and Corporate Secretary, who will discuss the conduct of the meeting today. Brian?
Thank you, Jim, and good morning. We will conduct this meeting in accordance with the bylaws of GATX Corporation and the rules of conduct posted on the meeting site today. All shareholders of record on March 1, 2024, are entitled to vote at the meeting, and I have been advised that a quorum for the conduct of business is present. Shareholders who wish to vote at this meeting may do so now or at any time until we declare the polls closed by using the vote link on the meeting website. Any shareholder who has already voted and does not wish to change their vote need not take any further action. Questions may be submitted now by clicking on the Q&A dialog box at the top of the screen. If you submitted a question prior to the start of the annual meeting, there's no need to submit it again.
Non-shareholder guests will not be permitted to submit questions. We will now proceed with the formal business of the meeting. There are three items of business to be considered by the shareholders. The first item of business is the election of the nine nominees named in the proxy statement to serve on the board of directors until the next annual shareholders meeting or until their successors are elected and qualified. The second item is to approve the compensation of the company's named executive officers. This proposal is a non-binding shareholder advisory vote. And finally, the third item is a proposal to ratify the Audit Committee's appointment of Ernst & Young LLP as the company's independent registered public accounting firm for 2024. The company recommends that shareholders vote for each of the director nominees named in the company's proxy statement and vote for proposals two and three.
Voting will now be conducted on the three items of business presented. If you have already voted by proxy, by internet, or telephone, you do not need to vote at this meeting unless you want to change your vote. I now declare the polls closed and return the meeting to Jim. Jim?
Thank you, Brian. I would now like to turn the meeting over to Bob Lyons, who will provide an update on our company. Bob?
Thank you, Jim, and thank you all for participating this morning. I'd like to reiterate Jim's comment regarding Steve Wilson and thank him for his service to the board of GATX and to the shareholders of GATX. He certainly did provide great insight and counsel, and mentorship to a lot of us here at GATX, and his presence will be missed on the board. So on behalf of the all shareholders, we thank Steve for his service. What I'd like to do today is provide a quick overview of the 2023 financial results and then talk briefly about each of our business units. 2023 marked the continuation of a strong momentum we have built in recent years.
We reported $7.07 earnings per share on a normalized basis, which reflects a 16% increase over 2022 and a 12% return on equity. Importantly, every segment in the company contributed to this strong performance. And I'll also note that in addition to the financial results, we identified very attractive investment opportunities, deploying $1.7 billion in 2023, the fourth consecutive year north of $1 billion. I believe these investments will pay very attractive dividends and returns to our shareholders in the years to come and decades to come. Turning to our business units. In our largest segment, Rail North America, we continue to perform well despite very modest growth in rail traffic.
This is a testament to our strong team, our highly diversified portfolio of rail cars, and to the breadth and depth of our customer relationships, many of which go back decades. Our poor performance is also driven by our maintenance network and our capabilities. Every day, our dedicated employees on the shop floor focus on safety, efficiency, and delivering for our customers, and they have helped put us in a very good position going forward. Turning to Rail International, which is comprised of our platforms in Europe and India, we are well-positioned to capitalize on growth dynamics in these two unique markets. In Europe, there is growing effort to shift more product from truck to rail for many beneficial reasons. With a fleet of nearly 30,000 wagons and the most experienced team in the industry, we will take full advantage.
In India, one of the fastest-growing economies in the world, there's continued need for infrastructure development. Whether it's building of roads, ports, housings, or commercial buildings, all of these will require significant raw materials that can and do move by rail. With a fully established team, the only one of its kind in India, and a fleet approaching 10,000 wagons, the growth outlook is very positive. The pandemic and post-pandemic recovery proved once again that global air travel is remarkably resilient. Through our joint venture with Rolls-Royce, which we've had for over 25 years, we have built one of the largest portfolios of spare aircraft engines in the world. We've added to that with our own direct ownership and engines, managed by our joint venture partner, which opens another avenue for growth.
Global air travel has historically doubled every 15 years and is expected to do so again going forward. GATX, along with our valued partner, Rolls-Royce, will capitalize on that growth. Having just acquired Trifleet a few years ago, our initial focus has been on integrating the business fully into GATX and validating the thesis upon which we made the acquisition. Despite a challenging market in 2023, the Trifleet team performed very well, and tank containers, a long-lived, widely used asset with a service component, fit very well into the GATX portfolio. GATX is fortunate to have a very stable, long-standing shareholder base. I like to believe that part of the reason for that is that we try to be very clear on our commitments and our objectives, and very consistent, too. One and two here, noted below, are very much linked in terms of our commitment to shareholders.
We invest in long-lived assets, and we seek to earn an attractive risk-adjusted return on capital across the business cycle. We participate in cyclical markets. We're fully aware of that, we understand that, and we use it to our advantage. To the extent there is capital remaining to return to our shareholders after we make those investments in our core business, we do so, and we've done so for over 100 years in terms of dividends and periodic share repurchase. We'll also continue to reexamine our platform and our business and adjust given the rapid change in technology. Lastly, as a public company, the market and shareholders cast the ultimate vote on our performance, and that manifests itself in our total shareholder return.
2023 was a very good year on that front relative to peers and industries, as we posted a 15.2% total shareholder return. It's hard to compete with the S&P 500, given that it's driven by a handful of stocks, the so-called Magnificent Seven. If you rebalance and focus on the S&P Equal Weight, our performance in 2023 was very strong. Same for the three-year period, with a 15.4% total shareholder return, and importantly to GATX, our ten-year return of 11.4%. We think in terms of decades at GATX, so that 10-year return is very important to us. Thank you for your time. Thank you for your continued support of GATX. With that, concludes my statements.
Thank you, Bob. Brian, do you have the report of the inspector of election?
Yes. The inspector has tabulated the votes, and her preliminary report indicates, one, each of the director nominees named in the company's proxy statement has been elected. Two, the non-binding advisory resolution approving the compensation of the company's named executive officers has been approved. And three, the appointment of Ernst & Young as the company's independent registered public accounting firm for 2024 has been ratified. The final report of the inspector of election will be filed with the minutes of this meeting. I would now like to turn the meeting back over to Bob to respond to any questions we may have received from our shareholders.
We have no questions from shareholders. I now turn the meeting back over to Jim.
That concludes our annual meeting, ladies and gentlemen. In closing, I would like to thank our employees for their continued hard work and our shareholders for their continued support. Thank you all for participating in our virtual annual meeting and for your interest in GATX.
This concludes the meeting. You may now disconnect.