Betsy Graseck: I guess a couple of questions. Well, I know we talked through the institutional securities business already on moving that expense ratio a little bit. Could we dig in a little bit on the wealth side, because the expense ratio there is running a little higher, and so it would be useful just to understand the pace or speed or timeframe when we should expect to see that start to inflect?
Jane Fraser: Yes, absolutely. And some of it, just as a reminder, the actions that we’ve been taking on org simplification and that Andy’s also been taking in the wealth business. We will work through notice periods in the coming weeks, and so you’ll see the impact coming through in our headcount numbers, and in wealth and the expense base next quarter. Look, As Mark said in his opening and Andy’s been talking about, this should be a sort of up to a 30% pre-tax margin business. Andy’s focused on rationalizing the expense base. He’s also, as Mark said, turning on the growth engine, he’s enhancing our platforms and capabilities to elevate the client experience. The heart of the opportunity for us lies with our existing clients.
They are an extraordinary client base, but they’re under-penetrated. So [now] (ph) the operating efficiency is frankly going to be — is going to come on the revenue side here. That said, Andy’s taken a number of pretty decisive moves this quarter on the expense side. Mark, let me pass it over to you.
Mark Mason: Yes, I mean, look, I think that the quarter expenses that you see of growth of 3% is not yet reflective of the work that Andy has been steadfast at. There is still some investment in there in technology and in the platform that’s important, but I think coming out of the first quarter you’ll start to see some of the reduction in expenses that’s a byproduct of that work. And the work has been across the entire expense base in the wealth business. So that includes non-client-facing roles and support staff. It includes looking at the productivity of existing bankers and advisors. And those kind of reductions will start to play out in the subsequent quarters. I do want to point out, as Jane mentioned, this is a growth business for us.
And so you can see on some of the metrics on page 15, the bottom left, some of those good signs of investment momentum. And I highlight that because as the expenses come down from some of those efficiencies, there will be a need for us to continue to invest and replenish low-performing or low-producing bankers and advisors with resources that actually can generate the revenues we expect and take advantage of the client opportunity that’s in front of us. So long-winded way of saying, there’s some operating efficiency upside for us for sure is a combination of the top-line and the expense we’re playing through the balance of the quarters in the year here.
Operator: Our next question is from Jim Mitchell at Seaport Global. Your line is open. Please go ahead.
Jim Mitchell: Okay, good morning. Jane and Mark, I very much appreciate the comments on your growth opportunities and driving growth, but revenues are often dictated by the macro that – it’s a little bit out of your control. Can you talk a little bit about the flexibility on the expenses, you have a range in 2026 of [51 to 53] (ph), So if revenues are coming in below the targets, is it, I guess, a, fair to assume you’d be at the very low end of that range, or is it — and I think there is some revenue growth built in there. So is there some flexibility to the downside to try to get your targets in a tougher revenue environment? Thanks.
Mark Mason: Yeah, look I mean with the top-line growth as you’ve heard us say, is a CAGR of 4% to 5%. We put that target out there [51 to 53] (ph) as a range of what we’re working towards. We’re given you a good sense of how we expect to get there with the $2 billion to $2.5 billion reduction by then. We’ve already signaled the $1.5 billion that’s in front of us. The reality is that if there’s softness in revenues, that’s why we have a range. Obviously, the volume-related expenses would come down with any softness in revenue. And depending on the drivers of why that revenue is softening, we’d look at the investments that we’re making across the business and make sure that those are appropriately calibrated for where we are in the cycle and what we’re seeing on the top-line.
With that said, we’ve got to continue to invest in the transformation. We’re not going to compromise that. That’s going to be something that we have to spend on to ensure we continue to get right. But that’s kind of how the dynamic works. There’s a top, we’ve got a mix of businesses that I think we’ve demonstrated resiliency around if you think about the past couple of years. And we expect for those to continue to drive some top-line momentum but we’ve got levers in case they don’t.
Operator: Our next question is from Ebrahim Poonawala at Bank of America. Your line is open. Please go ahead.
Ebrahim Poonawala: Thank you. I guess just one question, Mark. Around capital. So you talked about [$13 billion] over the Reg. minimum. You could easily be doing 2 times the buyback you did in one quarter, if not more. I know you don’t like to talk about out quarters, but give us a sense of, at least this quarter, should we expect the pace of buybacks to increase and if you could provide additional color as we think about the rest of the year would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.
Mark Mason: Sure, look – and I’ve said it repeatedly, Jane has said it repeatedly given where we trade, we think buying back is smart and we’d like to do as much as we possibly can and — as much as makes sense, in light of the uncertainty that’s out there. We have run at about [$13.5 billion] (ph) this quarter. That does give us capacity above the [$13.3 billion] (ph). (Technical Difficulty) we want to make sure we can support the clients that want to do business with us, whether that be in markets or other parts of the franchise. And then there’s still uncertainty out there about how the capital regulation evolves. The good news is, we are hearing kind of favorable things about how the Basel III endgame proposal could evolve, but that hasn’t happened yet.
