Jefferies is hopeful that 2023 will mark a “trough year” and that business will back up from here, Chief Executive Richard Handler and President Brian Friedman say in a joint statement issued alongside the bank’s 4Q results. In the company’s investment-banking unit, “curtailed new capital markets issuance was compounded by a dampening of merger and acquisition activity among our corporate and sponsor clients,” the executives say. Revenue for the quarter fell 17% and earnings were cut in half.