Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to Cohen & Company's second quarter 2018 earnings call. My name is Hillary and I will be your operator for today. Before we begin, Cohen & Company would like to remind everyone that some of the statements the company makes during this call may contain forward-looking statements under applicable securities laws. These statements may involve risk and uncertainties that could cause the company's actual results to differ materially from the results discussed in such forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements made during this call are made only as of the date of this call and the company undertakes no obligation to update such statements to reflect subsequent events or circumstances. Cohen & Company advises you to read the cautionary note regarding forward-looking statements in its earnings release and in its most recent annual report on Form 10-K filed with the SEC. I would now like to turn the call over to Mr. Lester Brafman, Chief Executive Officer of Cohen & Company.

Thank you, Hillary. And thank you everybody for joining us for our second quarter 2018 earnings call. With me on the call is Joe Pooler, our CFO. We're pleased with the results for the second quarter of 2018. Revenue in the second quarter was driven by better performance in our broker-dealer business as well as gains in our Asset Management and Principal Investing segments. We continue to focus on the development of several new revenue sources across our Asset Management and Capital Markets platforms that are less dependent on the day-today fluctuations of the financial markets. We recognize there's still work to do and remain focused on enhancing stockholder value. In the second quarter, we continued to pay our quarterly dividend. Now, I will turn the call over to Joe to walk through this quarter's financial highlights in more detail.

Thank you, Lester. Starting with our statement of operations, our operating income was $1.4 million for the quarter compared to operating loss of $360,000 for the prior quarter and operating income of $1.7 million for the prior-year quarter. Our loss before income taxes was $826,000 for the current quarter compared to $2.2 million for the prior quarter and income before income taxes of $615,000 for the prior-year quarter. During the second quarter, our income tax benefit increased to $636,000. We expect to have additional net operating loss carryforwards available to offset a portion of our deferred tax liability in future years. The related reduction of the deferred tax liability is recorded as an income tax benefit. And the net income attributable to Cohen & Company was $80,000 or $0.07 per diluted share for the current quarter compared to net loss of $1.5 million or $1.26 per diluted share for the prior quarter and net income of $426,000 or $0.35 per diluted share for the prior-year quarter. And each period presented fully diluted shares outstanding change depending on whether or not the conversion shares from our 2013 and 2017 convertible notes are deemed dilutive. Net trading revenue came in at $7.2 million in the second quarter, up $995,000 from the first quarter and up $1.1 million from second quarter of 2017. Our Asset Management revenue totaled $3.2 million in the quarter, up $1.4 million from the prior quarter and up $1.5 million from the year-ago quarter. In the current quarter, there were one-time performance fees related to our European separate accounts. Also, the successful auction and liquidation of the Dekania Europe I CDO included auction fees and previously unpaid subordinated management fees. There will be no more revenue from the management of the Dekania Europe I CDO. New issue and advisory…

Thank you, Joe. Please direct any investor questions to Joe Pooler at 215-701-8952. His contact information is at the bottom of our earnings release or via email to investorrelations@cohenandcompany.com. Thank you for joining us today. Operator, you can now end the call.

This concludes today's conference call. You may now disconnect. Presenters, please hold.