And so, I feel like we have the best talent in our business. I feel like our brand as an employer in the market is very, very strong. It doesn’t mean everybody wants to work here. Of course, we’re a big company and as we all know, there’s lots of things that come with working at a bigger company. But I like how we’re positioned. So, M&A, yes. Does it create opportunities for talent acquisition? Much like – we saw a bit of talent breakage when we acquired JLT. Folks sign up for working at a certain place, and when you have that kind of change, it’s an opportunity possibly for folks to think through what they want to do going forward. I like how we’re positioned in that respect. And then back to your other comment, yes, there are a number of bigger businesses, particularly in the risk space that are likely to change hands over time.
Brian Meredith: Great, thanks. And then I guess my next question, could you talk a little bit about kind of the M&A environment, particularly in the risk business, multiples being paid, what the pipeline kind of looks like there, more competitive, less competitive.
John Doyle: Yes, thanks, Brian. We remain very active in the market. As I said earlier, last year was our biggest year of acquisitions, other than 2019 when we did JLT, over a long period of time. We’re very selective. We’re looking for high performing businesses, well led businesses in attractive markets. As I mentioned, we want growth businesses with the ability to grow earnings as well. The three bigger deals that I highlighted in my prepared remarks, we’re very excited about Honan in Australia. It gives us really an anchor platform deeper into the middle market in what’s a very important and attractive market for us. Graham here in the United States, another step forward for us at MMA and then BT Westpac in Australia, strengthening our wealth business.
So, we have a couple of deals that we announced in the later part of last year. Vanguard’s OCIO operation, a career business, those will close sometime over the next the next few months. So, we’re going to continue to be active. Much like I was talking about our brand as an employer, our brand as a buyer is also quite strong, right? We do what we say we’re going to do. And so – and then on valuations, four really attractive assets. Their multiples remain high. And so, anyway, but we’ll continue to deploy capital that way. And as Mark mentioned, we’d rather deploy capital on attractive inorganic and organic investment for that matter over share buybacks. But in the course of a year, you never know how things will run. But the pipeline is quite strong at the moment.
Thank you, Brian. Andrew, next question.
Operator: Our next question comes from the line of Andrew Kligerman with TD Cowen.
Andrew Kligerman: Hey, good morning. John, you talked about the great unknown in terms of loss cost inflation, social inflation. On the flip side, we’ve seen a few carriers report, and their results have been exceptional. So, I understand that you’re kind of projecting out some good pricing, but at what point does that give and take ratio change and we kind of see some softer pricing, and how would that affect Marsh?
John Doyle: So, look, as I’ve said a couple of times on this call, we’ve been working very hard at becoming a better growth business. We’re not an index on P&C pricing. Of course, we’re exposed to it. And just to be clear, I wasn’t trying to project higher casualty prices over time. Our job is to get the most efficient risk financing as we can for our clients. But what I can tell you is, it is quite clear that there’s stress emerging in casualty. There’s no question about it. There are some casualty cats that are out there that are concerning to underwriters and buyers, and we’re just seeing greater frequency of mega settlements, and for that matter, even judgements on individual cases. Core inflation, of course, is something that’s always a factor in the market. And you see that – you’ve seen some of that manifest itself in shorter tail lines from carriers. But we’re all quite concerned inside of our risk business about where casualty loss costs are headed.
Andrew Kligerman: Thanks for that one. And then my second question is just the stellar growth, underlying growth in Asia Pacific at 10%, LATAM at 11% in risk and insurance services. Question is, what particularly you seeing in those markets that is driving some of that excellent growth? And then underlying that, what is Marsh doing differently from the competitors?
John Doyle: Yes. I mean, we’re very proud of our businesses in both of those regions. They’ve been growth leaders for us over the last several years. I would point out, it’s one of the things that JLT brought to us in 2019. We expanded our footprint and brought along much greater distribution in both Latin America and Asia. But Martin, maybe you could talk a little bit more about both of those regions.
Martin South: Yes, as you say, I mean, we’re the clear market leader by some margin in Asia-Pac. There’s several factors. We have literally market leadership in every single major geography there. We are able to bring all of our best capabilities from around the world to there. We have great teams, very specialized, a very strong employee benefits business. We have scale. We’re able to attract and retain talent in a way – there’s just – there’s real momentum there. And the same can be said in Latin America. Slightly different economic dynamics, obviously, with Latin America. A big protection gap. A lot of opportunities market leadership in the areas there, and still quite an unconsolidated marketplace. So, we like the fact that we built our businesses organically, so the cultures are strong.
