Looking Ahead: A Discussion on the Current Landscape Amidst Uncertainty Featuring Roger Altman and Jason Sobol

the horrible Hamas attacks occurred on October 7th.

So we're essentially, we're nearly three weeks removed from that.

So far, while there's a lot of sensitivity at the Board of Director level and the CEO level to the conflict, and in large part because it's just simply so horrifying, and because they have employees and customers and other constituents who are very sensitive to it and concerned about it, they've been quite vocal, generally, at least to their own employees.

But in terms of their planning and the intersection of their planning with what we do, I don't see much effect yet.

I think there are two more powerful things going on than this conflict so far.

One is pent-up demand for transactions.

We've come through a slow period.

Everybody knows that.

We're still in a slow period.

But there's a lot of pent-up interest in strategic transactions.

But the other factor is a counter factor and going in the other direction, which is we've seen a sea change in interest rates.

And we seem to be now, we seem to have come out of a long period, which began in 2008, so 15 years, of ultra-low interest rates.

And there's a strong point of view, I share it, that that period is over.

That's just over.

And we have, at the moment, a 10-year Treasury yielding 5%, highest rate on the 10 years since 2007, I believe.

And that change in interest rates affects returns, especially for sponsors.

And it negatively affects them.

It affects asset allocation.

That's between appetite for equity, appetite for fixed income, and safety, appetite for safety.

And it's a very important change.

A lot of people haven't quite incorporated that change into their thinking.

But I can see a lot of people, on the other hand, who are.