Barclays Capital had another record year. Barclays Capital is a client focused business. We have taken the simple formula of offering financing and risk management services to clients, and applied it with discipline to a steadily expanding array of activities. The business has expanded quickly through the investment of the last two years. As a result of growth in Asia, continental Europe and North America, over 70% of its income now comes from outside the UK. We have also increased the range of our investment banking activities by product, particularly in the areas of mortgage backed securities, equity products, commodities, and derivative products across all asset classes. But we remain very demanding of short term performance and medium term returns, and profits in Barclays Capital have grown strongly.
Barclays Global Investors achieved outstanding results, with assets under management now exceeding US$1.5 trillion. We are seeing brisk growth in the areas of exchange traded funds, fixed income and cash management. 2005 was a year of strong headcount growth which reflects our confidence in the position which BGI has in the industry. This position is underpinned by BGI's investment performance track record – which is outstanding – and by demographics and the fiscal pressure on governments to provide retirement solutions for their citizens.
Our goal is to position our Wealth Management business as a leading European wealth manager. This is a business undergoing rapid transformation. The pick-up in profits in the last two years has been striking, but the most important feature of our progress is good growth in the client base, and in assets under management and lending balances.
In Barclaycard, the challenging consumer environment and consequent rising levels of bad debt in the UK contrasted with stable credit conditions and very good growth in other markets. Our strategy here has been to diversify, through partnerships in the UK (providing Sky TV customers with a credit card offering would be a good example of this in 2005) and by rapidly expanding Barclaycard International. We now have nearly 4.5 million cards in issue internationally. Our growth prospects are underpinned by the rapid development of Barclaycard US, by our joint venture in Scandinavia with Swedbank launched in 2005, and by our acquisitions of Banco Zaragozano in Spain in 2003 and of Absa in South Africa.
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