Slawomir Krupa
CEO & Director
All right. Good morning, everyone. I would like to extend my thanks and a warm welcome to our shareholders, bondholders and analysts joining us here in the room in person, but also online. We deeply appreciate and value your continued commitment and engagement with Societe Generale. Today is an important milestone for us. It’s an opportunity to step back, assess our achievements, discuss where we are headed and more importantly, explain how we intend to keep creating value for our shareholders.
In 2022, the group was in a difficult position. Our organization was too complex. Our operating model was not efficient enough. Costs were too high, profitability was too low and a weak capital position hampered our ability to grow and to distribute value to shareholders. But it was also clear that the group had strong franchises and a clear potential, a potential, however, that was not translating consistently into financial performance. The average profitability languished at around 6% for the 2018-2022 period.
So in 2023, we set out to fix that. We established a strategic road map with clear priorities to build a