Peter Orszag: I’ll start and then Mary Ann can come in. Look moving forward, as I’ve said before — well, first to start with we have two very cash-generative businesses as markets normalize. And as we move forward in time, we are going to be putting an increased emphasis on using that cash flow for the inorganic opportunities that we see in asset management, obviously, beyond the dividend. And so I would highlight for example, we have a new Head of CorpDev who is starting in the next two or three weeks, as we add additional capabilities to explore inorganic opportunities that we see on this pivot and diversification of the Asset Management business. We are going to approach that in a very disciplined manner. And obviously, way that use of cash and that use of capital against other potential uses including buybacks and deleveraging. Thanks.
Mary Ann Betsch: So a couple of points. James, just to clarify my comments on buybacks were for the full year and we did buybacks in the first quarter primarily, but not this quarter. So just to make sure that’s clear. And then on the pace of buybacks going forward, as Peter just said, that’s one of the uses of our excess cash and we certainly plan to offset dilution from stock comp over time. I would just sort of note that the pace may be a bit uneven based on other opportunities that we have. So it’s not great for modeling, but I would expect to offset, but not necessarily immediately or as quickly as we have in the past.
James Yaro: Okay. That’s very clear. Thank you very much.
Operator: Thank you. Our last question will come from Mike Brown with KBW. Please go ahead.
Mike Brown: Hi. Great. Good morning.
Peter Orszag: Good morning.
Mike Brown: Peter, you mentioned part of the plan for the Asset Management business is to pivot and diversify into private markets. And understanding that this is going to be a multiyear process. But just wanted to hear a little bit more about that, what could acquisitions look like there? It sounds like it’s early days. You mentioned that you just hired someone in the kind of CorpDev side of the business. But how do you think about bringing on the right assets to scale on the Lazard platform, while also paying the right price or it can be accretive just given the valuations in the space are certainly high in the private market side?
Peter Orszag: Yeah. So here’s the way I would look — I would sort of phrase that. We’re acting with urgency, but also discipline focused on obviously trying to find the right fit, not just making an acquisition for the sake of making one. I’d highlight not just price, but cultural fit as being extremely important to making sure that the inorganic strategy and the programmatic M&A is its success over time. We’re particularly focused on private asset managers with some degree of established track record that are still relatively early in their AUM progression, where they could benefit from our prestigious brand in our distribution network a global distribution network. And we benefit from their diversification of offerings and performance.
And we see a lot of opportunity to acquire firms of this size and at this stage, as they may be too small to move the needle at the very large alternative asset managers, and too large to integrate into firms much smaller than we are. So, there’s a sweet spot for us and we’re going to again act with urgency but also take the appropriate care to find the right match, because we are fully cognizant of the risks of deals going astray or integration that doesn’t work. So, you should expect — again, I use the word programmatic on purpose. We are going to do this over time. And we’re going to wait to make sure we get the right match. But as soon as we see the right match, we are going to act decisively.
Mike Brown: Okay. Great. Thank you for that. And just maybe one kind of follow-up on the Advisory side of the business. You had mentioned in your prepared remarks that the private equity side, it is getting more active. What is that starting to look like at this stage? Is it still more about kind of the dialogues? Or are you starting to see things kind of falling into place? And if you think about historically, what would be the final hurdles here that would need to get that cohort to become more active?
Peter Orszag: Well, let me say a couple of things. First, outside of M&A, we have lots of business with private capital/alternative asset managers that’s our Lazard Capital Solutions practice in the private credit and other fundraising vectors in our restructuring and liability management practice in our PCA, our funding business, which had a lot of activity, especially in the secondaries component of its business last year and that continues into this year. And then, to the heart of your question, we are just seeing I think after a period of time in which private equity was trying to — was a little bit on the sidelines with regard to especially sell side, their core business model is being transactional coming back online.
I don’t — so I think, it’s just — it was a matter of time. And we’re seeing that in our dialogues. I think it’s also apparent from the commentary from some of the leaders of the biggest alternative asset managers that they’re coming back. I think they said coming back on the playing field and that’s the way I would describe it. So, the level of activity is not what it was yet in 2021. It’s clear also that our dialogue with strategic started to get more serious earlier than with private equity but that is now re-equilibrating and we’re seeing a lot of dialogue with private equity around M&A, specifically in addition to the other ways in which we interact with them.
