6  BIS central bankers’ speeches
At the same time, business start-ups remain at a record level, at over 400,000 excluding microentrepreneurs. Similarly, we do not have any general concerns about the reimbursement of SGLs. Since February 2022, we have received 671 requests, covering less than 0.1% of the total number of SGLs. Of the EUR 143 billion that have helped close to 700,000 businesses, EUR 46 billion have already been repaid. And today, over 95% of businesses are repaying their SGL correctly. The Banque de France's Credit Mediation remains mobilised in each of your départements to address the most difficult cases, within the framework of the "local agreement" renewed for 2023. Regarding households, growth in housing loans still amounted to +5.3% in December (and +5.1% in January) in the context of a gradual rise in the average rate, which then stood at 2.05%,2 compared with 2.9% on average in the euro area and 3.5% in Germany. In France, housing credit remains the cheapest,  1 2  Business failures | Banque de France (banque-france.fr) Excl. fees and insurance; Loans to individuals — December 2022, Banque de France, 3 February 2023  Page 4 sur 5 most abundant and safest in Europe - with 97% of outstanding loans at fixed rates. Source: ECB Of course, we have come out of the years of exceptionally easy credit. Nevertheless, the financing needs of the real economy are still largely met, thanks to the soundness of French banks.