BGC Partners, Inc.

Good day, everyone, and welcome to the BGC Partners Third Quarter 2021 Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speaker presentation, there will be a question-and-answer session. Please be advised that today's conference call is being recorded. At this time, I'd like to turn the conference call over to the Head of Investor Relations, Jason Krasickis. Thank you, and please go ahead.

Thank you, and good morning. We issued BGC third quarter 2021 financial results press release and presentation earlier this morning. You can find these at ir.bgcpartners.com. Please note you can find additional details on our quarterly results in today's press release and investor presentation. Unless otherwise stated, the results provided on today's call compare only the third quarter of 2021 with the year earlier period. We will be referring to our results on this call on an adjusted earnings basis unless otherwise stated. We may also refer to adjusted EBITDA. We may refer to our liquidity, which we define as cash and cash equivalents, plus marketable securities that have not been financed, reverse repurchase agreements and securities owned, less securities loaned, and repurchase agreements. We define total capital as reasonable partnership interest, total stockholders' equity, and non-controlling interest in subsidiaries. Please see today's press release for results under generally accepted accounting principles. Please also see the relevant sections in the back of today's press release for the complete and updated definitions of any non-GAAP terms. reconciliations of these items to corresponding GAAP results, and how, when, and why management uses such terms. Additional information with respect to our GAAP and non-GAAP results on today's call is also available on our website at ir.bgcpartners.com. I also remind you that the information regarding our business on today's call that are not historical are forward-looking statements, and these include statements about the effects of COVID-19 pandemic on the company's business results, financial position, liquidity, and outlook. Any forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties. And except as required by law, BGC undertakes no obligation to update any forward-looking statements. Any outlook and targets discussed on today's call assume no material acquisitions, buybacks, extraordinary transactions, or meaningful changes to the company's stock price. For discussion of additional risks and uncertainties, which could cause actual results to differ from those contained in forward-looking statements, see BGC's SEC filings, including but not limited to the risk factors and special note on forward-looking information set forth in these filings and any updates to such risk factors, and special note on forward-looking information contained in the subsequent reports on Forms 10-K, Forms 10-Q, and 8-K. With that, I am now happy to turn the call over to Howard Lutnick, Chairman of the Board and CEO of BGC Partners.

Thanks, Jason. Good morning, and thank you all for joining us for our third quarter 2021 conference call. Joining me for today's call are BGC's Chief Financial Officer, Steve Biscay, and our Chief Operating Officer, Sean Windyatt. Earlier today, we announced the launch of FMX, our combined U.S. Treasury and futures electronic marketplace, along with a clearing agreement with the LCH. Leveraging the success of our proven state-of-the-art FedEx UST platform, our FMX futures solution will challenge the status quo of the current U.S. futures markets. Our executed clearing agreement with LCH provides a unique cross-margining clearance solution for U.S. futures and interest rate swaps. FMX was created in response to its customers' need for an integrated trading and clearance solution that leverages the world's largest IRS clearing pool at LCH to provide significant cross-margin efficiencies. We believe FMX will offer a more optimal clearance solution for futures than the CME. With respect to value creation, we expect key strategic partners to invest in FMX, and our expectation is that FMX will open for futures trading in the middle of 2022. On Monday, we announced the closing of the sale of our insurance brokerage business, which delivered gross proceeds of $535 million, providing significant resources to continue repurchasing our shares and to accelerate FedEx growth. Since announcing the transaction in May, we repurchased and redeemed over 45 million shares and units. Our FedEx businesses continue to grow at a strong double-digit pace and provided record revenue contribution at approximately 23% of BGC's total financial services revenues versus 19.5% a year ago. This record FedEx contribution and significantly improved front office productivity drove adjusted earnings higher during the quarter. I'm happy now to turn the call over to Steve Biscay.