As the Chairman has introduced my colleagues, I will not take up time doing so. A copy of the presentation has been circulated in advance to members of the committee. In the time allocated to me, I do not propose to go through the pack in detail. Therefore, my opening remarks will reference a number of slides and I will hopefully deal with those.
Our presentation includes a range of details, including updates on key highlights from the bank's interim results for the first six months of 2016; our interim management statement from 28 October 2016 which updated the market on our financial performance; the regulatory environment in which our bank operates; our mortgage business and our approach to mortgage pricing; our position on mortgage arrears; and some details on the governance we have both internally and externally.
In addition we have returned to the committee the answers to the range of questions sent to the bank in advance. I thank the Chairman for his compliments to my colleagues who endeavoured to answer those questions. At the outset I must briefly reference the requirements that Bank of Ireland must observe as a public company. We are quoted on the Dublin and London stock exchanges. We make extensive disclosures to our shareholders annually through financial statements, presentations and other materials during our financial year, including our annual report, interim report, interim management statements and other markets as appropriate.
All statements made and information provided in this public forum are considered to be market information which is disclosed to all stakeholders at the same time. Therefore it has to be capable of verification and has been verified. Any comments that my colleagues or I make must adhere to the same standards.
Members will be aware that the State holds a 14% discretion shareholding in the bank, which has 86% private sector ownership. The State's shareholding is a matter for the Minister for Finance. Under our approved EU restructuring plan, with all state aid having been paid, the relationship between the Minister for Finance and Bank of Ireland is governed by a relationship framework agreement, which recognises that the bank is a separate economic entity, is managed on a commercial basis and engages with the Minister for Finance in accordance with best institutional shareholding practice.
Our financial performance is covered in slides 4 to 8. Slide 4 should give the committee some enhanced understanding of the scale of our business and our operations in the Republic of Ireland. We have a comprehensive multichannel distribution platform, including Ireland's largest branch network, augmented by 1, 770 self-service devices. We have more than 440,000 active mobile phone customers. We have market-leading positions across the financial sector in Ireland serving 1.7 million personal and 183,000 business customers.
Slide 6 sets out our business highlights for the first six months of this year. As I have already updated the market, I reaffirm that the group has continued to deliver on strategic priorities. One of our strategic priorities is obviously lending money and we have continued to be the largest lender into the Irish economy having advanced €3.5 billion of new money to Irish businesses and consumers in the first half of 2016, an increase of about 14% on a similar period last year.
The group continues to reduce the quantum of non-performing loans and the absolute number of customers who are in a non-performing category. We report an underlying profit of €560 million for the first six months of the year and all our trading divisions are contributing to group profitability.
Slide 7 outlines the geographic regions from which we derive our income. Approximately 70% of income from our group's operations comes from our businesses in the Republic of Ireland; some 25% is derived from our business in the United Kingdom, which includes, because it is in the sterling area, our universal banking business in Northern Ireland; and the remaining 5% of our total revenue is derived from our international operations, which are probably exclusively in continental Europe and the United States of America, through our leveraged finance business.
Slide 8 gives some detail on our engagement with the communities in which we operate and serve in Ireland. We have a number of activities which from our perspective are focused on encouraging enterprise, particularly in local communities, and supporting in particular small businesses and start-ups. Most of these events take place in our local branches where our business customers are invited to showcase their business and advertise their products and services to new and existing customers. During our last national enterprise week in May 2016, we hosted 750 events countrywide and approximately 3,000 businesses took part. We will have another such event starting next week.
We also have an activity, called "enterprise towns" where we work with the local communities, businesses communities and sports, social and charitable organisations hosting major community events which are open to the public. These activities are important to us as a commercial business to encourage community development in rural Ireland.
We have been looking at the configuration of our branch network, the reduction in the number of people utilising our branches and the fact that we have that space. We have been converting a sizeable amount of the floor space within the branch network and we provide it to start-up businesses on a free basis to start their businesses, engage with each other and get advice from our staff. We have opened five of those to date, two in Dublin and one each in Cork, Galway and Limerick. More than 500 start-up companies have used Bank of Ireland workbenches to start their business. That is important to us because it encourages enterprise and also, hopefully, those people will let us quote for their business.
Slide eight shows the continuing investment being made in the bank meeting our changing customer needs. In that context, I wish to mention the work we do with customers in the Republic to support them in the use of new technology, whether that be desktops, use of the Internet or smartphones. In particular, we are conscious of the fact that some of our customers are at different life stages or have different familiarity with the digital world. We have groups of advisers throughout our branch network who engage with the active retirement groups, transition year students, business customers, farmers and community groups by holding events in our branches, local halls, communities, libraries, nursing homes and so forth. That supports our customers not only in how to interact with us through online channels but also in being more comfortable using technology generally. We have had 3,000 such sessions with senior customers so far this year.
Slides ten to 16 set out some key points from our interim results in more detail. Obviously, because of the nature of this engagement and the fact the members are representatives of the taxpayer, we have set out the fact that we received €4.8 billion from the taxpayers. That money has been repaid in full. We have returned in excess of €6 billion in cash to the taxpayers for the investment and the contingent liability support that was provided. I confirm that as of October the taxpayers do not have any risk or liabilities to Bank of Ireland under the eligible liability guarantee scheme. The State holds a 14% shareholding in Bank of Ireland and at today's share price that is worth approximately €1 billion.
Slides 18 to 20 detail the latest financial performance update, which we provided to our shareholders in October. That confirms that we continue to trade in line with our expectations and continue to meet our financial objectives.
Slide 19 focuses on asset quality in the business. It confirms that we continue to make significant progress in reducing the quantum of non-performing loans across our group. They have reduced by €800 million to €9.1 billion at the end of September and the defaulted loans have reduced by €600 million to €8.1 billion. I confirm that the reductions are across the geographies in which we operate and across the asset classes - corporate, property, business, mortgages and unsecured consumer lending.
I am providing the committee with a market update as well. In the nine months to the end of September our total new lending in all of our business, including into the Irish market, was €10 billion. That compares with €9 billion on a constant currency basis for the same period in 2015, so our new lending is up approximately 11% on the same period last year. Our capital ratios continue to be supportive of our strategy. Our core equity tier 1 ratio on a fully loaded basis was 10.5%, and in the period from the end of June to September we generated approximately 30 basis points of organic capital. I should point out that since the end of September the movement in international bond yields will have significantly reduced our accounting deficit and our capital ratios will have improved quite materially in recent weeks because of that accounting movement in our defined benefit pension schemes.
Given the committee's focus on mortgage pricing and mortgage arrears, slides 26 to 30 give significant detail on that. Slide 28 reflects our pricing strategy. We keep all our pricing for all our products across the group under constant review and there is a range of factors for the bank, as a responsible lender, to consider. In terms of mortgage pricing in Ireland, we have a particular focus on fixed rate mortgages. I confirm that 75% of new mortgages provided by the Bank of Ireland in the Republic of Ireland in the past nine months have been at a fixed rate. Our mortgage lending in the nine months to the end of September has increased from our mortgage lending in the nine months to the end of 2015.
Slides 32 to 39 give comprehensive detail, which is also covered in the questions, on our mortgage arrears. Again, the mortgage arrears show that there has been a continued reduction in owner-occupier and buy-to-let mortgages in arrears. At the end of June 2016, 3.3% of Bank of Ireland's owner-occupier Republic of Ireland mortgage arrears were greater than 90 days in arrears. That compares with an industry average, excluding Bank of Ireland, of 9%. Bank of Ireland mortgages in the Republic of Ireland which were greater than 720 days in mortgage arrears also continued to reduce.
Slides 43 to 44 give some further detail, outside of the financial results, of the work we do within the community, particularly in Ireland. In May 2016, Bank of Ireland was awarded a businesses working responsibly mark from Business in the Community Ireland for our work in that regard.
We set out in slide 46 why we are highly focused on our strategic objectives. We remain Ireland's largest lender. We have market leading positions across our businesses. Our businesses are strong and financially robust. Our business model is working for our customers and our shareholders.
I thank the committee for its attention. I and my colleagues look forward to the members' questions, although perhaps not necessarily look forward to them but hopefully we will answer them professionally.