Scott Beiser: I think we are experiencing still a relatively active marketplace for us as a principal to acquire interesting and hopefully additive businesses to our organization. We never know whether everything we are talking to will close or none of them will close and they all take a different time line. So as Lindsey had said, we try to factor in the magnitude of what we are looking at, maybe some probability assessment of what we are looking at in closing kind of what other of our cash needs are, and I think, that’s probably. It’s a combination of a variety of factors that have tempered a bit our repurchases over the last quarter or two.
Unidentified Analyst: Great. Thanks, guys.
Scott Beiser: Thank you.
Operator: And we will go next to Devin Ryan with JMP Securities.
Brian McKenna: Great. Thanks. This is Brian McKenna for Devin. So the syndicated credit markets are still largely shut, but the private credit markets are functioning and are filling this fold in a pretty meaningful way. So how has this impacted your capital markets business and what kind of opportunities does this create near-term and over the longer term for this business?
Scott Beiser: So short-term, the reduction in total number of players that are able or willing to provide financing and the total number of deals that you have got willing buyers and sellers is down, so that puts some negative pressure on our capital markets business. On the long-term, we think, in fact, what’s occurring is going to be good for us and the rest of our industry participants. Effectively, when it’s harder to find capital, we have always said our typical competitor here is not another investment banking firm, it’s the CFO who believes that he or she can do it themselves or it’s a private equity firm who believes they can do it themselves. So as things have gotten a little more difficult over the last year, we are seeing more people turning to institutions like ourselves to go raise that financing for them.
So like I said, short-term, still probably is a little rocky compared to a year ago, but long-term, we think actually what’s happening much like what happened in the 2008, 2009 time period will result in a more positive trend for aging of a financing in the private marketplace, which is what we specialize in.
Brian McKenna: Helpful. Thanks. And then just bigger picture, thinking about the next leg of growth you clearly have deep relationships with sponsors and continue to expand related capabilities. But what else can you do with sponsors longer term that could drive some incremental growth across the business?
Scott Beiser: So, first of all, I think we have been very dominant and successful in our financial sponsored arrangements out in the U.S. and we are growing rapidly in Europe and then we will continue that pace in the Middle East and Latin America and Asia, et cetera. So there’s some geographical expectations that we have. And we continue to find incremental types of services that we can provide to many of these financial sponsors. So part of it is learning what they need and what they want as long as it fits the kinds of services that we have or could continue to expand, that’s part of the growth strategy.
Brian McKenna: Nice job.
