Consumer fundamentals are good with strong home equity and credit quality, but dependent on labor and wage growth. Small businesses are earning well but concerned about labor availability.

Mid-sized clients are using lines of credit less actively than pre-pandemic. If rates come down, it will favor small business and middle market borrowers who borrow at short-term rates, making them slightly more aggressive.

IPO market is opening up, private equity firms need to sell businesses they've held long, leading to strategic activity and large mergers.

We think the economy grows at 2.4% next year. That's an environment where deals and things should take place.

There are 4,000 competitors in banking and non-banking sectors. The primary way to manage expense growth is through headcount management.

Over last 5-6 years, headcount relatively flat but added 4,000 technology coders and 2,000 relationship managers while engineering out processing capabilities.

With 8% annual turnover (16,000 people), hiring 14,000 means going down 2,000 people - opportunities to shape headcount.

Expense growth year-over-year is about 4%+, but adjusting for FDIC credit from last year, it's 2.5-3% in a 2.5-3% inflation environment - pretty good management.

Investing $4.2 billion annually in initiative technology spend (on top of $10 billion base) and in people globally to stay competitive.