史提夫金融 (SF) 2026 年第三季財報電話會議：財富管理營收創新高與第四季展望

重點摘要

• Stifel Financial 公布 2026 年第三季 Non-GAAP 淨營收為 14.3 億美元，創下第三季歷史新高的每股盈餘 (EPS) 1.46 美元，年增 12%。稅前淨利率達 22.5%。
• 今年累計營收成長 9% 至 43 億美元。EPS 成長 7% 至 4.33 美元，若扣除前一年的訴訟費用則年增 22%，有形普通股權益報酬率 (ROTCE) 為 24.1%。
• 全球財富管理業務營收達創紀錄的 9.8 億美元，年增 8%，主要受惠於資產管理營收與淨利息收入。客戶資產規模達 5,760 億美元。
• 隨著單季放款成長達 13 億美元，淨利息收入來到 3.02 億美元。管理層預估第四季淨利息收入將落於 2.95 億至 3.05 億美元之間。
• 法人機構業務營收下滑 14% 至 4.3 億美元，主因 9 月利率急遽波動導致交易評價損失並減少交易營收。投資銀行業務營收總計 3 億美元。
• 在成本自律與股票回購的支撐下，管理層預計第四季營收將大致持平前一年創下的 15.6 億美元紀錄，並預期 EPS 將進一步提升。

關鍵財務數據

業務與營運表現

全球財富管理

全球財富管理營收成長 8% 至創紀錄的 9.8 億美元。客戶總資產成長 6% 至 5,760 億美元，而按費計酬資產成長 9% 至 2,400 億美元。若扣除與 SIA 相關的資產，增幅分別為 8% 與 12%。

儘管單季資金淨流量略呈負值，但管理層表示顧問招聘儲備強勁。在過去 12 個月中，Stifel 新增了 90 名顧問，其中包括 28 名經驗豐富的顧問，過去業績貢獻達 1,900 萬美元。管理層指出，在招募競爭激烈的環境下，公司正鎖定大型團隊，同時保持嚴格的紀律。

該公司在 2026 年放款組合擴增了約 36 億美元，接近其 40 億美元的全年目標。綜合存款管道增加了約 16 億美元。Stifel 還指出了約 29 億美元的表外存款、180 億美元的貨幣市場基金以及 70 億美元的短期國債可作為潛在資金來源。

Stifel 對 Meow Technologies 進行了戰略投資，並就其平台簽署了長期授權協議。管理層預期這項白標資金管理技術將強化創投與基金銀行業務、提升存款收集能力，並擴大財富管理與法人機構業務的服務能力。

法人機構業務

法人機構業務營收年減 14% 至 4.3 億美元。投資銀行業務營收下降 6% 至 3 億美元，不過今年累計法人機構業務營收成長 8%，投資銀行業務營收則大幅成長逾 23%。

諮詢業務營收季增 10% 至 1.73 億美元，交易活躍於金融、工業、消費與醫療保健領域。股權融資營收年減 13% 至 6,900 萬美元，固定收益承銷營收則維持在 5,800 萬美元的穩定水準。

固定收益交易營收從約 1.23 億美元下降至 8,000 萬美元。下滑原因包括受 9 月利率變動影響的 900 萬美元交易評價損失，以及基期較高的影響（去年同期包含 3,200 萬美元的重組與飛機相關收益）。

股票交易營收自 5,900 萬美元降至 4,100 萬美元，反映了歐洲業務重組、交易量下降以及股票做市庫存約 700 萬美元的評價變動。法人機構部門今年累計稅前淨利率提升 530 個基點至 18.9%。

資本配置

Stifel 在本季回購了 160 萬股，同時資助了 13 億美元的放款成長。該公司在回購授權額度下仍剩餘 620 萬股。

管理層表示，資本優先事項包括資產負債表擴張、股利、技術投資與股票回購。公司對於未達到報酬率要求的收購案仍保持審慎態度。

管理層展望

• 受惠於放款成長、穩定的淨利差與放款手續費，管理層預期第四季淨利息收入將落於 2.95 億至 3.05 億美元之間。
• 假設 9 月的利率劇烈波動不再重演，管理層預期第四季法人機構交易營收將介於 1.45 億至 1.5 億美元。
• 全年薪酬費用比率預計將落在公司指引區間的低端。
• 假設股價保持穩定，管理層預期第四季有效稅率為 19% 至 22%，反映與股票酬勞相關的超額租稅優惠。
• 假設沒有額外的回購且股價維持穩定，預計第四季稀釋後總股數約為 1.588 億股。
• 管理層預計第四季營收將大致持平前一年創下的 15.6 億美元紀錄，並預期 EPS 將提升。

風險與關注領域

管理層強調了地緣政治緊張局勢、高利率、能源價格、通膨疑慮再起以及資產估值偏高。9 月利率波動的速度放緩了市場活動，並導致法人機構庫存產生交易評價損失。

財務顧問的爭奪戰依然激烈，可能會推升招募成本。市場波動也可能延後顧問跳槽與客戶的決策時程。

管理層表示，投資銀行業務儲備依然強勁，但交易時程對金融狀況、選舉和客戶信心相當敏感。固定收益活動的表現也弱於管理層在年初時的預期。

分析師問答亮點

• 顧問招募：管理層表示招募動能依然正面，但日益聚焦於規模更大、生產力更高的團隊。Stifel 打算維持報酬紀律，而非僅靠提高招募條件來競爭。
• 結構性利潤率：管理層將薪酬費用比率下降歸因於效率提升計畫、國際業務重組以及淨利息收入的成長。2026 年底的退出水準被視為評估 2027 年的良好起點。
• 基金與創投銀行業務：管理層認為這些業務處於成長的早期階段。預計技術投資將有助於在不增加實體分行網絡的情況下，擴展存款生成能力。
• 存款資金來源：在完成 SIA 資產轉移後，約有 5 億美元的轉存資金流出平台。儘管資金組合發生變化，管理層仍強調其多元的存款管道以及淨利差的穩定性。
• 交易營收：管理層指出，在扣除庫存評價影響以及較難預測的重組或飛機相關收益後，1.45 億至 1.5 億美元為常態化的法人機構交易營收區間。
• AI 策略：Stifel 正利用 AI 來提升顧問生產力、會議準備、後續跟進與分析。管理層表示，他們認為 AI 是輔助顧問而非取代他們。
• 資本優先事項：管理層指出，放款成長能強化公司特許經營實力並創造豐厚報酬，同時鑑於公司的超額資本與剩餘授權額度，股票回購仍是積極考慮的選項。

法說會逐字稿全文

完整財報電話會議逐字稿

管理層陳述

Operator

Good day, and welcome to the Stifel Financial Q3 '26 Financial Results Conference Call. Today's conference is being recorded. At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to Joel Jeffrey, Head of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Joel Jeffrey

Thank you, operator. Good morning, and welcome to Stifel's Third Quarter 2026 Earnings Call. On behalf of Stifel Financial Corp., I will begin the call with the following information and disclaimers. This call is being recorded. During today's presentation, we will refer to our earnings release and financial supplement, copies of which are available at stifel.com.

Today's presentation may include forward-looking statements that are subject to risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to differ materially. Stifel Financial Corp. does not undertake to update the forward-looking statements in this discussion. Please refer to our notices regarding forward-looking statements and non-GAAP measures that appear in the earnings release.

I'll now turn the call over to our Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Ron Kruszewski.

Ronald J. Kruszewski

Thanks, Joel. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us. Our results year-to-date and for the third quarter, again underscore the strength of Stifel's diversified business model. We're on track for another record year. Year-to-date revenue was $4.3 billion, up 9%, earnings per share of $4.33, which is up 7%. And if you exclude the impact of last year's legal charge, EPS is up 22% with return on tangible common equity of 24.1%. Revenue and pretax margins in both of our operating segments are up year-to-date and investments we've made in our efficiency initiatives continue to generate strong returns.

The third quarter began with healthy client activity but conditions got choppier in September as geopolitical tensions, rising in the new prices and renewed inflation concerns led to the Federal Reserve's first rate increase in 3 years. It was a speed of the movement rates more than their absolute level that unsettled markets. Through it all, corporate earnings and employment state supportive and the underlying U.S. economy continue to show real resilience.

Against that backdrop, we delivered our highest ever third quarter earnings per share of $1.46, up 12% versus the prior year. Net revenue of $1.43 billion was in line with our guidance of another record quarter in our Global Wealth Management segment offset market-driven slowdown in our institutional business. Our bottom line growth was the result of improved operating leverage as we posted our lowest compensation ratio since the fourth quarter of 2022, which in turn drove a pretax margin of 22.5%.

The strength of our business allowed us to continue to generate and deploy significant excess capital. In the third quarter, we increased loans by $1.3 billion, and net interest income exceeded our guidance. setting a third quarter record that was essentially in line with our highest ever quarterly total. Additionally, we repurchased 1.6 million shares as our strong capital position enables us to support clients return capital to shareholders and invest in growth even when markets are volatile.

That brings me to our recent strategic investment in Meow Technologies, one of the leading business banking fintech in the United States. Along with our investment, we entered into a long-term licensing agreement with the company. Under this agreement, we will have access to all current and future capabilities of the platform. This will provide our bank with a leading-edge white label treasury management platform for our venture fund banking and other commercial clients. This transaction accelerates the build of one of our fastest-growing businesses, our venture banking platform.

Additionally, this technology broadens our capabilities across our institutional and wealth segments, giving Stifel an AI platform and bringing family office capabilities into our wealth management platform. We believe it is a significant enhancement to our growing venture and fund banking platform.

Slide 2 should look familiar since we used it about 4 years ago to point out that we saw the disconnect between our performance and our valuation compared with, in this case, Raymond James and Morgan Stanley, 2 partners I respect and whose business models look a lot like ours. Since the end of 2016, earnings per share are up 406% and tangible book value was up 154%, which is better than either of these peers and our return on tangible common equity over the last 12 months is more than 26% and is the highest of the 3 on this page. Even so, we trade at 9x forward earnings compared to 10.2 for Raymond James of 13 from Morgan Stanley. Look, even through challenging times, we are growing and have an elite ROTCE. Simply the numbers don't support the valuation gap that I see.

With that, I'll turn it over to Jim.

James Marischen

Thanks, Ron, and good morning, everyone. Non-GAAP earnings per share of $1.46 came in ahead of consensus, a stronger investment banking revenues, higher net interest income and well-controlled expenses, more than offset softer transactional revenue. Total non-GAAP revenues of $1.43 billion were flat with a year ago and 1% below consensus. Investment banking revenue exceeded expectations by $12 million or 4% as both advisory and underwriting revenue surpassed Street expectations. Net interest income of $302 million came in above the high end of our guidance and $4 million above consensus primarily due to strong loan growth and higher loan fee income.

Transactional revenue came in 10% below expectations and decreased 17% from the prior year. I'll cover the components in more detail when we get to the institutional segment. Asset Management revenue increased 14% from the prior year, driven by market appreciation and net new asset growth was essentially in line with consensus. Expenses were again well controlled, and we continue to see the benefits of the efficiency initiatives of the past few years. Our comp ratio of 56.6% and was in line with consensus and improved from 57% in the second quarter. Noncompensation expense declined 4% sequentially and beat The Street estimate by 3% and as lower credit provisions, travel and entertainment and nonbank reserve expenses contributed to the decline. The effective tax rate was 24.4%, which was slightly below consensus but within our guidance.

Turning to Slide 4. Global Wealth Management generated record net revenue of $980 million, up 8% year-on-year. Results were driven by record asset management revenue and record third quarter net interest income, partially offset by a decline in transactional revenue. We ended the quarter with total client assets of $576 billion and fee-based assets of $240 billion, up 6% and 9%, respectively, as we benefited from stronger equity markets, and net new asset growth. Excluding the impact of the assets associated with SIA, total client assets and fee-based assets increased 8% and 12%, respectively. Net flows were slightly negative in the quarter, but our recruiting pipeline remains very strong, even with competition for advisers running high.

Over the prior 12 months, we've added 90 total advisers, including 28 experienced advisers with trailing production of $19 million. We increased our loan book meaningfully in the quarter as we generated nearly $1 billion in incremental fund banking loan more than $200 million in residential mortgages. Based on part of this incremental growth and a stable NIM, in addition to the higher loan fee income in the third quarter, we expect fourth quarter net interest income to be in a range of $295 million to $305 million.

As you can see on Slide 4, we have significantly grown our net interest income since the beginning of 2024 through balance sheet growth as our net interest margin has remained relatively consistent. For the year, we've already grown our loan book by roughly $3.6 billion, which is just shy of our full year guidance of $4 million. Our strong deposit gathering capabilities continued as our combined deposit channels are up roughly $1.6 billion. Given our mix of assets and liabilities, we are relatively rate agnostic, and we've been able to maintain a consistent NIM as our funding mix has shifted. As we look forward, our ability to fund further growth is supported by approximately $2.9 billion of deposits held off balance sheet and roughly $18 billion of money market funds and 7 billion short-term treasuries.

Turning to Slide 5. Through the first 3 quarters of 2026, institutional revenue is up 8% and driven by an increase of more than 23% in investment banking. In the third quarter, the segment generated $430 million in revenue, down 14% year-on-year. In the quarter, Investment Banking revenue in the segment totaled $300 million, down 6% year-on-year. Advisory revenue of $173 million increased 10% sequentially, with continued strength in financials industrials, consumer and health care. Equity capital raising revenue was $69 million, down 13% from a year ago, though issuer engagement is increasing, led by financials and health care. Fixed income underwriting revenue of $58 million was in line with last year's third quarter results.

While higher interest rates weighed on new issue volume in the third quarter, fourth quarter activity is off to a strong start. We remain the #1 negotiated issue manager and public finance by deal count with more than 13% market share year-to-date. Overall, we are optimistic about investment banking as our pipelines remain very strong, and we're seeing increased engagement from sponsors and improved expectations for depository M&A. Fixed income transactional revenue of $80 million was down from approximately $123 million last year, primarily due to $9 million in trading marks in the quarter. as a result of the sharp move in interest rates in September and $32 million in restructuring and aircraft gains in the prior year quarter.

Equity transactional revenue was $41 million, down from $59 million a year ago primarily due to our European restructuring, lower equity volumes and approximately $7 million of training marks in our equity facilitation inventory. Absent another rate move like September, we'd expect fourth quarter institutional transactional revenue be in a range of $145 million to $150 million. Year-to-date, our pretax margin of 18.9% is up 530 basis points from the same period a year ago. as we've meaningfully reduced our comp and noncomp ratios primarily as a result of the -- our international restructuring.

Moving on to expenses. Our improved operating efficiency showed up again and a lower comp ratio for the quarter, which was our lowest since the fourth quarter of 2022. For the full year, we are projecting our comp ratio to be at the low end of our full year comp guidance. Non-compensation expenses totaled $298 million, flat with the same period a year ago, as lower provision and investment making gross ups were offset by higher operating expenses. Our operating noncompetitio of 19.4% was within our full year guidance of 18% to 20%. Further, assuming a stable stock price, we expect to see a fourth quarter effective tax rate in the range of 19% to 22% based on the excess tax benefit related to stock-based compensation.

Turning to Slide 7. Our capital position remains strong and provides meaningful strategic flexibility. The Tier 1 leverage ratio came in at 10.8%, while the Tier 1 risk-based capital ratio of 17% reflecting the deliberate deployment of capital into loan growth. Based on a 10% Tier 1 leverage target, we ended the quarter with nearly $360 million of excess capital, and that's after funding $1.3 billion of loan growth buying back 1.6 million shares during the quarter. Finally, we have 6.2 million shares remaining under the current buyback authorization, assuming no additional repurchases and a stable stock price. Our fully diluted share count for the fourth quarter is expected to be approximately 158.8 million shares.

And with that, Ron, back to you.

Ronald J. Kruszewski

Thanks, Jim. Before I turn the call over to the operator for questions, let me comment on our outlook. In our Wealth Management segment, competition for advisers is running at elevated levels. And while our recruiting pipelines remain robust, we're staying disciplined to make sure that our growth generates the appropriate return. We believe AI will make our advisers more products, not replace them. The client when experienced advisers and a broad set of adjustment options in uncertain times.

Global wealth management has been and will continue to be the foundation of Stifel's business and its recurring revenue provides us consistent, predictable growth even in volatile markets. We're on track for another record year in this segment remain on target to reach our goal of $1 trillion in client assets. A key component of our wealth segment is People Bank & Trust, which supports our wealth and institutional clients. We've significantly grown our loan and deposit gathering capabilities in recent years as we continue to execute on our long-term strategy to grow net interest income with a stable net interest margin without taking undue credit risk.

Our institutional business is a meaningful driver of top and bottom line growth and strong markets. In the third quarter, September sharp move in rates produced trading marks on our securities inventory, which we don't expect to read in the fourth quarter. Advisement capital raising, we have strong backlog and improving client engagement. And going forward, we see increased activity levels across our diversified investment bank. Putting everything together, last year's fourth quarter was an all-time record at $1.56 billion in revenue, and we expect to match it this year even with volatility that slowed what was a very strong investment banking market in the first half. We also expect earnings per share to be higher as we've kept our cost discipline and repurchased 6.8 million shares.

So let me close by saying that as I look forward, I'm optimistic. We're mindful of geopolitical risk, higher interest rates and energy prices and elevated asset valuation. But healthy client engagement, strong wealth management fundamental and an active pipeline of strategic and sponsor-led transactions give us real reason for confidence. People diversified model, recurring revenue disciplined capital management have us positioned to keep compounding value for shareholders regardless of market conditions.

Operator, with that, please open the line for the questions.

Operator

[Operator Instructions] We will take our first question from Mike Brown with UBS.

分析師問答

Michael Brown

Ron, I guess you talked a little bit about the recruitment environment. As you look at the quarter here, it looks like to us the implied growth was a little bit softer this quarter. but obviously, the environment remains very competitive. So maybe could you just on some of the recruitment trends you're seeing in the market today and then maybe give us kind of an update on the real-term hiring activity. you talked about the pipeline as robust. And maybe how does that compare to recent quarters? And what's your kind of view on converting that pipeline as we look at the balance of the year and into early '27?

Ronald J. Kruszewski

I feel that a lot of things recruiting is strong, and it has been strong for us. I mean, not only over quarters, over years. I mean that it's hard to look at quarter-to-quarter. It always has been. But when I look at our recruiting numbers, outlook, what we're hearing and we will accrue I feel very good about that business. That is very competitive, couple competition with the choppy market that always slows people down. Clients get nervous, markets more volatile. And we're -- we take a long-term view.

So I get this question every quarter and every quarter, I'd say that we're a firm that we had net positive recruiting and we'll continue to do so. And I'm optimistic about who we're talking to. I would say that there's a change over the year it's that we've probably lowered the absolute number of advisers that we talk to while increasing the trailing 12 coming in, meaning we're recruiting higher teams. And I think that's very productive and good. And finally, as I said every quarter, I'm continually amazed at one question, is going to replace all our advisers on the second meeting I have, I talk about the recruiting competition packages are high they've ever been. So -- but overall, it's a positive for us and positive for our growth rate going forward.

Michael Brown

Great. Yes, certainly conflicting messages out in the market. Ron, I guess I wanted to ask about the comp ratio and the pretax margin. So very strong results this quarter. and Jim gave a guide for the year. As we think about the shift in the business mix at Stifel, you've got really strong growth in the venture and the fund finance business. You've repositioned Europe. So should we kind of view this as evidence that this a structurally lower comp ratio at Stifel and a higher margin profile going forward? Obviously, in a normalized environment, can you kind of sustainably operate at this lower comp ratio level?

Ronald J. Kruszewski

Well, look, first of all, we're going to pay our people competitively. We're going to provide a step in the place where you can do business, but we can also do well for our bankers and advisers and everyone else. And the comp ratio is a result of, frankly, driving efficiencies and not being inefficient on a number of things. So as we grow our -- as we grow our business and become more productive, 1 of the things that's going to happen in lower your comp ratio. And then finally, as you grow our net income, frankly. That also drives the comp ratio.

It's always at this time of the year that I'd like to point out that we're pretty consistent of not only driving comp ratio lower year enter conservative at the beginning of the year, and we're driving shareholder returns and margin where it often times, you'll see when I work quarter price or comp ratio in the quarter that is going to be much higher because we underaccrued. But next year will be much better. And so this is very consistent, with Stifel, over the years, you'll see competition generally decline and reach their level -- their best levels in the fourth quarter which often -- usually it's our best quarter of the year.

James Marischen

We'll come back next quarter and provide some more granular detail on our 2027 outlook. But given our eyes that we're going to get to the lower end of the range for 2026 and you think about some of the dynamics that play in 2027 we're generating a lot of deposits today. We're having a lot of loan demand. We're going to continue to grow the bank balance sheet. We're going to continue to grow net interest income. And so that going forward is going to be the biggest driver of where the comp ratio could go. But I would say the jumping off point of where we get to for 2026 is a good kind of thought process on how you think about that going forward in 2027.

Operator

We will take our next question from Devin Ryan with Citizens Bank.

Devin Ryan

Wanted to ask a question on low growth and kind of the book broadly. Obviously, you guys are tracking really well relative to the $4 billion objective, and we all see the momentum in fund banking. So I want to dig in just a little bit more on that component. And can you talk a little bit about the growth there. How much is like cyclical, just meaning it's a good environment. There's larger draws and that can maybe bounce around versus structural with everything you're doing to bring in more clients.

And as we think kind of bigger picture, like how big are you comfortable this part of the book getting to as a percentage of the overall loan book? And maybe within the strategic benefits that maybe are outside of the NII that you're seeing from growing some banking?

Ronald J. Kruszewski

Fund and Venture Banking together. I feel we're to support the analogy, but we're early innings into growth rate. I talked about some of the things we need to do. Overall, the overall market, especially in funding, I think the markets increased as a lot of money that's being raised and refi them and rent. And so I see that just structurally within the market as a growing within our focus has not only there, but on the metro side, it's to be providing technology that gives us the business to begin. That's why we didn't transaction that I mentioned on this mean technology.

If you want to look at something similar, you'll see where [indiscernible] acquired [indiscernible]. And I think [indiscernible] acquired Capital One. We've taken a different approach in that we want to white label this. But when we looked at our ability to generate significant -- I'm talking about significant posts to drive this business. We needed this technology genic account opening, USD, a stable crypto backed USD cross-border corporate credit cards, payroll, all of the we have what we believe is going to accelerate our ability to get clients. And I've talked about in an investor call, and I can thank what we do in suanhat I was talking about.

And so I'm very optimistic about this business. And it will grow faster at least advantage of certain tasks on the deposit 4 to 5 to 1 deposit. And then we'll deploy some of that more in fund banking or the ratio is almost split long due to a lot of deposits. But it's a business and we track and measure referrals to wealth for the banking mortgages that we're giving to founders, et cetera. So it is a business where we feel we bring all the capabilities of people to this segment of bank.

James Marischen

The investments we've made here and not just in technology but in people, it's helped us take market share across both fund banking and on the vital space. And you think about a direct output of this, we've been talking about generating around $1 billion a quarter of deposit growth with the technology investment in and the capabilities that has to offer we should see that number increase as that goes live, and we have a more competitive treasury product. And I think that is a very scalable deposit generation channel as we look forward.

Ronald J. Kruszewski

And it's across our business, all right? We -- AI, what we're talking about is being able to service clients. In this particular case, we talk about more of a narrow aspect of final venture banking. So when you think about what we're going to do and how we're going to grow this business. We can do that without opening a single branch or putting any sick or more. None of the often the incremental NII on top of what we've already built. We've built the foundation we just are putting some technology on it, and we're going to gain market share.

Devin Ryan

Okay. I appreciate all that background. As a follow-up, I want to dig in a little bit on the investment banking commentary. Sounded, I think, relatively constructive in fourth quarter off to a good start, which is good to hear. Can you talk a little bit more about what you're seeing in the specific businesses? And like what for example, you mentioned depositories seeing additional activity.

Like what do you -- what's the catalyst for that? You talk about enthusiasm into 2027. And then obviously, technology has been an area, particularly in software that's been challenged. Are you seeing that stabilize. So to any additional flavor for like what's actually happening beneath the surface that's driving activity across your businesses? And then if you can just hit on some of the sectors that we all know you have strengthened.

Ronald J. Kruszewski

Look, I think what happened was we had a very strong board and a lot of engagement, a lot of things that people are talking about. I did not just step us across the street. And not just the people, but across the street, you ran into a quarter where rates, inflation rates, geopolitical, all converged late August into September and slowed activity down significantly, which is to we expect thrown uncertainty in the mix, add a little bit now that we're a few weeks of election that may change some outlook in the short run.

So we've seen a, what I view as a financial condition induce cost, if you will, in activity. But when we look at face-care getting canceled and we're not too things that are getting done because of financial positions, I'm optimistic about the business in specific areas. You've had a slowdown in some of the health care capital markets that we've seen. We expect that to pick up story M&A, I think, is secular trend because of technology, deposit beta, stating the need for scale and the political realities of being able to get something done between now and '28 if there would be a change in administration. That's going to drive activity, and we don't see that change.

So I think this quarter will come a little bit more. It's off to a good start. We see it. It not like a turn the calendar page out of September. But that's how I see it, yes.

Operator

We will take our next question from Steven Chubak with Wolfe Research.

Steven Chubak

Wanted to start just on speed cash. The growth had lagged some of the metrics we've seen at your wirehouse peers just to understand what drove some of the more pronounced declines that we saw in the quarter and your outlook for discrete cash trajectory and just customer behavior in general as we enter a higher rate backdrop with potentially multiple hikes from the Fed?

James Marischen

Right. So I'll touch on sweep cash. One item we didn't touch on this in our prepared remarks, but one thing we'd highlight. With the sale of SINA, we still kept those assets on our platform and service over a period of time. So that cash was still within our ecosystem and our balances of cash. That's probably $0.5 billion that came out of our set balance in terms of activity in the third quarter. So I did highlight that when you're looking at the -- when we closed fully moved those assets off our system.

So the other thing I would say, just generally speaking, we typically see a seasonal uptick in deposits in the fourth quarter. we'd expect that trend to continue. We talked about other things that are going to drive deposit growth in the future. Obviously, Ron already touched on the investment in MA, what we can do there in terms of generating additional deposits in that channel. But overall, we got nearly $3 billion of deposits available to fund future growth. We've got $18 billion sitting in money market funds. We've got $7 billion in short-term treasuries. We can go attack those and bring those. So those are all the cash and cash equivalents within our ecosystem.

Now some of those things on money funds would be a little bit more -- a little bit higher cost, but those are deposits in our ecosystem that we can go get. And so we feel very comfortable overall where we're at from a deposit generation strategy and perspective. I think the other thing I'd say is, as we've seen a remix of our deposits, our NIM has been relatively stable. We've grown NII and at a stable NIM, even though we've seen this kind of reshuffle or remix of deposits. I think that fact is a little underappreciated at times.

Ronald J. Kruszewski

Yes. And I would underscore that. I just -- I feel that as there's a lot of focus on a small part of our funding base, we could see, we see tremendous ability to generate deposits and deploy loans and maintain some of the repricing that's going to be going on as the deposit, just everyone knows those as its economics has deposit base reprice so the asset side going to reprice.

And you're seeing it through our stable NIM. And you're going to see that throughout the industry. There's somehow there believe that you reprice cash, the industry is just going to collapse because you can't make any more net interest income. And I find that to be somewhat not consistent with economic theory. But that's for another bank.

Steven Chubak

Understood. And for my follow-up, I did want to ask on the brokerage commentary. So you spoke to the headwinds in the quarter. You were certainly not alone in experiencing that, especially on the muni side. You also indicated that we should see a recovery based on the guidance in transactional fees to $145 million to $150 million. Since equities is seasonally better in 4Q, it does imply continued softness in fixed income I just wanted to better understand how much of it is structural versus cyclical and whether we could see transaction fees get back to that $106 million legacy run rate even after adjusting for some of the business exits.

Ronald J. Kruszewski

Look, I think you can. I think we've been trying to say that we have, at least in fixed income, we have transactions that we that are nonrecurring recurring. That's what I'd say. They just don't seem to recur quarterly, okay. But -- so we, last quarter had almost $32 million in restructuring in aircraft. Those departments are up and running, they're doing business, the rate environment, as you can imagine, in any time to restructure to an aircraft, that impacts the we're getting something done during that quarter.

So that leaves fixed income, $95 million to $100 million today at run rate. We're growing that business, the volume business is equities around $50 million. I think equity text for challenging, but I think we can grow. You're seeing a decline to be completely restructured in Europe. But I don't to $160 million. I mean that's blink of an eye. That's nothing, $10 million or $40 million a $6 billion revenue base. And with a lot of I find that to be rounding air.

Operator

We will take our next question from Michael Cho with JPMorgan.

Y. Cho

I just wanted to touch on the valuation slide that you put up and reminded us about. I mean, it feels like feels like a larger deployment of capital toward M&A is off the table for now. I guess, one, is that fair? And then, two, I think repurchases stepped down a touch quarter-to-quarter, I get the volatility stock price, but is there more maybe a more aggressive approach to buybacks that you might consider if the disconnect continues to persist?

Ronald J. Kruszewski

Well, I think as it relates to your first question, yes, we're going to be very thoughtful about paying market multiples that are significant multiples of or in terms of EBITDA and capital required to run businesses. So I guess, I would think that, that's shareholders when they want us to look at the acquisition landscape, we want to grow, but we want to grow and be the firm that has higher than 20% ROTC, which isn't common in the bank, certainly come and margins that are robust. We're running this for shareholder value, not just for growth.

As it relates to your second question, I think it's a good one in that when we are looking at acquisitions, there is an attractive one out there, let's call it our own stock. Jim, in terms of how much we're doing, I'll leave that to you.

James Marischen

Right. So the pace of buyback to decline some in the quarter. I think I'd highlight is we did grow loans of $1.3 billion a quarter in addition to buying back $1.6 million shares. So we deployed a fair amount of capital. We brought our capital ratios down. Our excess capital still stands at a strong level of about $360 million. So we have flexibility to grow the loan book as well as buy back our shares, we've got plenty of authorization left on what we currently are authorized to buy back to continue to see us very active in that. You can just look at the share count on a year-to-date basis, to get a sense of how many shares we've taken out, and it's been pretty meaningful to that number.

Ronald J. Kruszewski

Yes. But that's the point. We -- it's just looking at numbers, if you use leverage ratio, we could have not grown our loan book and bought back another $200-something million. But what -- but our loan growth, we think, is adding to our franchise and our return on tangible and all of that. That's a good use of capital. Dividends is a good use of capital. the investment we've made in technology, which isn't an acquisition of an investment. That's a great use of capital. But as an absolute acquisition of something I just feel that out and told you we're buying something at 15 to 18x EBITDA, you would not -- The Street wouldn't react low. -- or not, but we're aligned there.

Y. Cho

Fair enough. I appreciate the color. I guess just along the similar conversation around capital priorities, Ron, in the past, you talked about increasing allocation toward recruiting, I guess, in terms of dollars and resources. I mean within this conversation on capital priorities, is that also impact how you're thinking about allocating or adviser recruitment going forward?

Ronald J. Kruszewski

Yes. I mean, in a lot of ways, it's a different math and adviser recruiting as it relates to capital and capital ratios are. We look at that more from a return on invested capital. We're hiring people, we're amortizing acquisition costs over 10 years, call it. And sometimes it's easy just to do that because they're kicking a lot of that expense down the growth. And so you coming up and saying, well, based on our recruiting, our comp ratio is going up, well then that might signal that we're either being aggressive in recruiting or maybe we're overpaying a little bit.

So -- but that's hard to see in the short run. We have done this for nearly 30 years and we've built this firm from $100 million in revenue, and we're at $6 billion with a 24% ROTC, and that's because we're capital disciplined. And I'm going to keep signing that. And if that means that we pass something that don't meet our capital returns the shareholders should be -- that should be a premium, not a discount to shareholder valuation in my opinion.

Operator

We will take our next question from Bill Katz with TD Cowen.

William Katz

Just like to stay on the FA recruiting discussion, if we could. I think you mentioned in your prepared remarks, you had negative growth in the quarter. I was wondering if you could maybe unpack that a little bit, maybe by channel, what you might be seeing, I think, Ron, you mentioned that competition is still pretty elevated. And underneath that, one of the things we're hearing is that these PE platforms are leveraging AI to really reduce the back office costs and then drive up the recruitment and TA packages. Where are you in terms of potentially including such technology in your own footprint which maybe allow you to be more competitive on pricing if needed.

Ronald J. Kruszewski

Well, I think we are utilizing AI more productivity. I've got something on back office, I mean, using AI tools to settle trades or something like that. I haven't seen that, but none of self-clearing, so that's not possible anyway. So -- but in terms of tools and being able to help advisers maybe have less assistance, I guess, that's possible. We're not taking that approach. We're using AI as a tool to help us and it's a powerful tool for prepare meeting prep, meeting follow-up analysis discussion. There's a whole bunch of things, but we're combining that with humans and I actually see the need for more people, not less.

So I don't know. I don't -- just not sure if I'm in a recruiting pitch and I say, "Hey, look, I can add a little bit more of your recruiting, but you can't have an assistant because you got to use a say I buy. I think I'm going to go down in my recruiting ability. I just do. But that's just, again, the private equity firms are dealing more in the independent and RIA space. So I don't really know. But clearly a productivity enhancer. We're making significant investments. We're resetting a lot of our tools. We're putting new tools in place. And I think it's a tailwind to what we're doing. I'm not going -- we're not going to reduce people and recruit up recruiting, but we're not doing that. Not now, we're -- it's not.

James Marischen

Everything within our wealth business is also in the employee channel. I would say of SAA, but we're no longer in the independent space at all.

William Katz

Okay. That makes sense. And just maybe coming back to your guidance. So it seems like you're going to be south of the $6 billion number for the full year. on your top line net revenue number and you guided to NII bouncing rising a little bit more. and that you have a little bit of a recovery on the transaction side due to lack of mark-to-market and you talk to the better investment banking backlog. So can you talk a little bit about where the residual weakness might be relative to expectation at this point in time? And then how long is the lead lag between the pipeline and actually revenue recognition through the advisory line?

Ronald J. Kruszewski

Yes. Well, look, let's -- what I said we're going to -- we expect to have -- we had a record, record quarter -- fourth quarter, but that's -- we expect that to be in that range. This is still not a hugely robust environment. That can change. Let's have the elections go and what happens after that. There are going to be a lot of repositioning of things that will happen post the election.

So look, as it relates to the guide, there are a couple of things we did a lot -- some of its accounting. For instance, we were conservative on the sale of SIA. We reported a $5 million gain on that, and we call it, we put it not poor because we have thought that, that probably shouldn't be important we were doing at the beginning of the year. That was in our thought process of revenue, same with our restructuring of Europe that we were doing of run rate revenues. Both of those items increased our margins, increased our return on tangible equity, but probably took out of our run rate $70 million, $75 million revenue. So if you add that in, you're back close to $6 billion of our rates.

Now why were we above that range. I would point, I think we thought the fixed income would have a better year. The rate environment, everything that's happened, some of the marks we took new to those returns, but I'm optimistic about that business, too. So I feel we're at the low end of the range of what we said in January and [indiscernible]. If you look at our GAAP numbers, our GAAP numbers, they just we reported -- we have put some of those revenues in GAAP, and we took them out of non-GAAP.

Operator

We will take our next question from Brennan Hawken with BMO Capital Markets.

Brennan Hawken

Ron, just start with a follow-up. I believe when you're answering Steve's question on trading. You mentioned $50 million for revenues in the in equities in the fourth quarter. Normally, we see a seasonal pickup. So was the seasonality that you historically have seen tied to Europe? Or is just the core operating environment softer. And so therefore, the seasonality is just not going to provide the same sort of uplift that we would normally see versus typical run rate.

Ronald J. Kruszewski

When I say -- I don't think this is good, and I'll let Jim go ahead and I don't see any disease in to be good. But when we say $145 to $150 that's kind of our run rate absent these marks in the inventory absent the one what you -- we try to tell you isn't always recurring. So that's not necessarily the fourth quarter. That's just trying to say, look, we've got a little bit of noise here, and this is what we see settling out.

The fourth quarter generally is seasonally better. We'll see that seasonality often depend on the election. We also get -- we get checks for our -- the old MiFID type thing where we get research checks that always helps, too. So that wasn't meant to be just a fourth quarter look. That's just trying to reset the orals expectations of what sort of normal, if there is such a run rate in institutional transactional revenue.

James Marischen

First of all, I agree with what Ron said. And I'd add to that, the European restructuring has an impact on this on what is a normalized run rate. That probably took out $5 million or $6 million a year-over-year comparison when we look at the fourth quarter. And so that's going to have an impact on an absolute number on what we did with those restructuring activities. So you have to take that in consideration when you're looking at these numbers year-over-year.

Brennan Hawken

Okay. I mean the transcript does say that you'd expect fourth quarter, rev, but okay, fine. Got it. follow-up question on the Slide 2-point and some of the discussion around net new. So One thing I'd point out is that both of those comps do disclose net new assets. So that might be something to consider. Maybe you said that net new was helpful. Was that quarter-over-quarter year-over-year? And if it was year-over-year, was it positive quarter-over-quarter.

And then for maybe a sub part of the consideration, one part that could result in the delta in the metrics could be scale. So would you consider looking to partner to be part of a larger, more powerful sales organization, potentially, which might allow for that realization and valuation to be capped or bridged.

Ronald J. Kruszewski

Did you ask me -- did you just asked me if I would sell?

Brennan Hawken

That is a very indirect way of doing it, yes.

Ronald J. Kruszewski

Well, I'll just give you a very direct clarification, okay? So that's -- hey, I don't mind. Look, that's a fair question. That is just a long way of asking it. But that's a very fair question. Look, where, okay, so you wherever it is, we were going to -- with those 2, I don't want to say because I'm not doing anything, but most financial institutions, we're going to sail into someone that has a lower growth rate and a lower return on tangible equity. -- and because of scale sense. I mean if I'm going to scale then I'm going to scale into someone get higher margins, higher return, higher growth rate.

So I understand a quarter can stand on its own, but we've put on that slide since 2016. So those check those numbers. So who's grown past. So I hear you now your question is, do we get a higher multiple, even though we combine with someone with lower financial metrics. The answer is no, but I can take the question. That's fair. I don't mean to suggest it's a topic question.

Brennan Hawken

Okay. Thanks for tolerating me.

Ronald J. Kruszewski

No, no, that's alright. I would come on your and ask the same question. That will be fun. But no, that's fair, but what is most -- and I'm just taking a moment here because most institutions that try to combine for scale in a people business and in a culture business, a business that's long and established a tafa with our growth rate, not like we're not growing. We'll find out that those lead to just economies of scale. Nonaccounting scale. So I'll leave you with that thought.

Operator

There are no further questions at this time. I will turn the conference back to Mr. Kruszewski for any additional or closing remarks.

Ronald J. Kruszewski

No, that -- well, I mean, the -- we appreciate everyone. I really often I want to complement all of our analysts, I like got provoking questions on my question that I want people to be comfortable asking. I would you also be comfortable in my answers. If you ask the questions, but I really do appreciate the fact that our analyst community takes the time to think about things that are outside the box. And to our shareholders, what I would say is that our business model is people really can put almost in its 3 buckets.

First and foremost, we want to serve our clients but all our resources to providing the best product services and advice that we can on the table. The benefit of serving our clients well falls under 2 buckets. One that our associates and partners can do well. And second is that our shareholder is not second but equally our shareholders do well. And that's how we manage the place. So we do not manage it to maximize of employees at the expense of shareholders. And frankly, we're not going to maximize shareholders at the expense of employees. Both of those are not good long-term ways to run a unit capital financial services firm. But with that, I look forward to reporting in the fourth quarter, and thank you for your time.

Operator

This concludes today's call. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect.