Unleashing the Potential of Treasury: Insights from a Seasoned Treasurer with Greg Packard

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To this week's Treasury Career Corner podcast where I interview treasury professionals about their treasury careers. Each and every week I talk to treasurers about how they build their careers, where they are now, where they see both themselves and the treasury profession going to next. And a special thanks to flywar, our fantastic sponsors. If you've ever wondered whether there was a way to ease your international transaction hassles, they're the guys to talk to. If you follow the link in our show notes you can see me talking to my mate Greg Levin, their Senior VP of Sales. I get to ask Greg about who are Flywire and how they can help you and your treasury team with your cross border payment headaches. Just follow the link to the interview in today's show notes. And now let's get on with the show. So welcome to this week's Treasury Career Corner podcast where I interview treasury professionals about their treasury careers. Each and every week I talk to treasurers about how they built their careers, where they are now, where they see both themselves and the treasury profession going to next. In this week's show I'm joined by Greg Packard, the former Vice President and Treasurer at John Bean Technologies Corporation, jbt. JBT is a leading global technology solutions provider to high value segments of the food and beverage industry with a focus on proteins, liquid foods and automated guided vehicles. So we'll talk a little bit more about that. We don't get too much into the companies. We're more about Greg's career, how he developed it and everything else. So we're giving that advice to you guys listening today. So Greg if you would, can you take us back to how you first started study time and then how you then at later stage discovered treasury which came along a bit later. Over to you sir.

Thank you Mike. Good morning. Sure, I can give a little history. My career and my life are all in my education are all based on a couple principles. One is I just love new experiences. So I grew up on the east coast of the US and I went to school in Los Angeles. So switched coasts and suffer from a genetic defect called accounting. In my family my father was a. My father was a partner at one of the big eight at the time to age myself. Two brothers were senior accountants I think managers at that same firm and I went to a different one of the big eights have always been about trying to my own path and new experiences. So my background is economics with accounting and then I started at a big eight which now is one of the big four again always trying to look for new experiences. So I had clients all across the, the different industries, manufacturing, not for profit, cable tv, you name it. So that's how I started my path into it. And I picked accounting not because I really enjoyed it but, but because I knew it would open doors for me and it would give me a solid foundation in the business world, which is another theme for me. It's. I can tolerate a lot of things for short periods of time if I know it's going to help me get to where I want to go. And that's how for me, I looked at public accounting. It wasn't a passion for me, but it was definitely a great pathway to understanding businesses and how they, the different parts of a business interact and where I might want to go further in my career once I had that kind of foundation.

And when you just going back to that, you just felt that was a good to have that basis sort of thing, that was something that you saw and you've used since then sort of thing. Because again, if I get people asking me, oh, should I do accounting, should I do this, do you think that's really helped?

I think it's been a tremendous help, to be honest with you, and in a number of different ways. But when I have over my career gone for positions in treasury, when they see the CPA with my name, that's always been a big positive. But even when I'm just doing my job, I the ability to anticipate the potential accounting and tax implications of the things we do in Treasury. We're moving money oftentimes across borders or even if it's not a cross border, it can have significant tax and accounting impacts and the choices you make may be impacted by those two other disciplines. Right. So you need to have that understanding. And I think by being a cpa, by having that accounting background, it helps me anticipate the issues that might be there or the questions that might be asked. And so I try always to get those resolved before I even go to senior management to get approval on something because they're going to ask those questions. And it seems so much better when you already have the answers and everybody's in alignment.

And it's a sort of. So it gives you that inbuilt checklist, if that's the right way to describe it.

It does, it just, it helps show that one that you as the treasury person understand the full implications of the transaction or whatever it is you are trying to recommend. And it also just avoids complications later. And that's what I've always tried to do. Is I want to do the homework up front and not do a repair job later. It's a great idea.

And then so what happened next?

So eventually I did want to leave public accounting and I fought it for a while, but I. Because they. They try to pigeon you hole. Pigeonhole you a little, excuse me, and into internal audit, which is where I ended up at fmc, which was another great experience actually. Audit teaches you a lot of things. One, how the company operates. But two, it's also how to work with people and go. You go into these situations as you're taken as a little bit of an advers in some cases. And if you can turn that around and become an ally and have people when you leave feel like you helped them or at least treated them fairly. That's a skill that can help you in any career, whether it's treasury or whatever you choose. But it's another great people building skill. But again it helped me learn the company very well. And one of my audits was of the treasury function, specifically the currency hedging function. And when I got in there I realized that the audit programs I had did nothing to address the risks that are in currency hedging. And I ripped them up and I wrote all new ones and audited based on those. And that caught the attention of the director in treasury and said you're the first person that's come in here and really tried to understand this from the. As an auditor and he appreciated it. And I said I enjoyed learning about this and if this position ever opens, I'd love it if you'd consider me. Which is another theme that I think all your listeners should know is that nobody cares about your career more than you. So you have to be your advocate. You have to let people know what you're interested in because people are willing to help, but they have to know what they're helping with. So I put that out there and then went into FP&A for a couple years and the position became open. And that's how I moved into Treasury.

And that's an interesting one. By the time this episode comes out when I've had Fred Shakmi, he's actually who's now with Technik FMC and things. I love that you've just said that. Obviously there's a commonality because he said exactly the same. You're the manager of your own career and no one else is going to manage it for you. So you've got to get on and do it. So obviously it may be, let's say Cultural thing. But you developed, I think you and I had talked about some of the people that you crossed over with at the time fmc though at the time again, you and I know it. Can you describe what the corporation was like at that time, sort of thing when you were there?

Sure. FMC was about 5 billion in revenue with about 5 different segments that each were about a billion dollars. So we were into chemicals, commodity chemicals, as well as specialty chemicals. We were into machinery, and that machinery is eventually down the line. What became FMC Technologies, which then became JBT as you broke down through various spins. But FMC itself was. It was very diversified. We had gold mines, we had operations for the defense industry. It was an exciting and very diverse company. But as I mentioned, in 2001, the chemicals businesses split and became what is still FMC. And the anything that was not chemicals became what was FMC Technologies, which was for primarily at that point, what is currently jbt, as well as oil field equipment and services. And then as oil became much more valuable, that business grew quite a bit that side of the business. And they became a pure energy play in 2008. And JBT spun out from that.

And then you made a change. Talk us through the next couple of bits because interesting change. A lot of corporate treasures, say group, treasury, corporate all the way through. But what happened next?

So after three years of being the manager of currency and commodity trading at fmc, I realized I really enjoyed being in the markets. I really enjoyed the pace, I enjoyed the just learning, being on top of what's going on in so many countries, the interest rates, the political environment, et cetera, et cetera. And I thought this, that would be a great opportunity for me to work on the bank side of the currency market. So I talked to one of my banks. They agreed that having the corporate background and going on the desk would be a good fit. So I moved to the Citibank FX trading desk in. At that time they had one in Chicago. They eventually moved everything, at least from Chicago to New York. But for my period there, I was working on Chicago on the corporate sales and trading desk.

And again I was gonna say, what was it like doing the sale, the switch from being customer to salesman?

In some ways it was easier for me because unlike the people that had only been on the bank side as I sat there, and again to date myself as I sat there on the other side of the phone, rather than on the other side of a screen, or now it's very much more automated. When I would talk to people, I would know their situation, I would know what they would have to do to get things done. And what I mean by that is a lot of people at the bank are like, oh, you should do this option strategy or you should do that. And it sounds so simple. But when you're on the corporate side, unless you've already gone through these things the first time through any option strategy, cross currency moves, you have to educate the people above you and get their approval. And there's a process there and it takes time and I understood that. So I could help either work them through that or come up with other solutions that might be easier for them. So for me, I found that to be both rewarding and a little bit of an easier conversion than probably maybe somebody that was only in the banking world.

I didn't understand that sort of thing. And then you progressed.

I like to think so because you.

Then went from city and then doing it yourself.

So I think after five years of working on the desk, I was in a position and again, themes in my life. I would rather try something and fail than not try at all. And I'm not saying I failed, but I did try. I was a day trader and I did it for three years. I enjoyed it again, a lot of freedom. I would a lot of just staying in tune with the world and this time a little bit more. I'm probably closely in tune with domestic economics and political situation and financial policies, but enjoyed all that and trading based on all that information, after three years though, you do realize there's a lot of risk on that side. Most of us think about when we're working for a company, you, your risk is losing future income, right? You lose your job, you lose future income. When you're day trading, you can lose future current and past income so that risk can wear on you. It's always there. We had our first child and our only child and I decided that maybe it was time to go back to the corporate world or at least think about it. And I mentioned that to a former colleague of mine and about a week or two later I got a call and was asked to join another colleague of mine to build a Treasury for JBT Corporation because they were spinning out and they were going to be all the treasury, accounting, et cetera, was going to be staying with the, the parent company. And so we were starting from scratch.

And then talk us through that role that you rejoined with JBT because you then grew your career for a number of years there. Can you talk it through?

I certainly can. One of my conditions when I took the job was that I would be doing more than foreign exchange. I'd done that for enough years, felt confident in my abilities there, but really didn't know a lot about the other sides of treasury, hadn't done them before. So what we did is you've had Joe Meyer, my former boss at JBT on he really took over kind of the spinoff related financing and all the capital markets. And I took over cash management, debt management and just building the team and putting in a TMS system and all of that good stuff. And so that's what we did. And we did it quickly and we were off the parents systems and processes. I think about three to six months ahead of schedule. We, we really just wanted to get our own processes and system in place and move forward independently. And we did that ahead of schedule. And it gave me a chance to hire people and understand over time more what I needed to look for in the people I hired and what was going to work best for us and how to build the team, the camaraderie, the everything needed. And so that's what I did for the first six years. And then after six years I was promoted to treasurer. And so then I moved more into the capital markets, insurance and all the other parts as well as managing what I had done before. And that was another growth experience and a really good experience.

You're making these steps up. If people are listening today and they're thinking, yeah, I want to do that, I want to get the next step up. How did you set yourself up for success? You said you got things, you were getting things completed sooner than rather than later. You're doing this. Was there any secret to it or was it just hard work or what was the thing that you were doing? More in a. I've got a lot of the practical stuff that's here on your resume and everything else. But more on a people side, how did you do that?

First of all, obviously I didn't do it on my own, right. I had to get the right people. And when I'm looking for people, it's not so much what their prior experience is, especially within treasury, because even within treasury there's differences at every company. I even from when I was doing the currency part, I could tell you 20 different ways to hedge things because I've seen probably 30 companies do it 20 different ways. So the experience, you really are going to learn more on the job. What I always look for are the people that one have strong personalities. I don't know of any treasury department that is overstaffed so we have a. They're generally lean and we have control over a lot of money and we're moving it regularly. I need people with strong personalities that, that will question if something doesn't look quite right, whether it's questioning me or whoever, to make sure we're not doing anything we shouldn't and to make sure we're doing exactly what we should. So I like strong personalities and I like intellectual curiosity. That's, to me is the critical thing. Are they trying to understand the why? Are they looking for a better way to do it? Are they doing that? Or are they just moving something from A to B and not questioning and not really caring? You can't have that in Treasury. So I learned that's what I needed. And by having those people we were able to move a little faster. We rely on our bank partners. Again, you've got to talk to multiple people that. I guess there's part of the intellectual curiosity. There's some intellectual. Not sure what the right word I would say is, but the ability to listen to three or four people talk about what, what you should be doing or what. Whether it's what you're going to do for a credit facility or whatever, to listen through and pick out the kernels that are consistent and probably accurate and then weed out the stuff that is just selling, if you will, from the people. And if you can do all that, you can do very well.

You as a. And I know that in you and I talked about how you manage people and I think again we try and get this onto the show about trying to describe to listeners and again listeners today. I recently gave a session. I'm just trying to think it was the Chicago session. I think it was, yeah, someone, one, one of the guys there was a Treasury manager, senior treasury manager, making the first step to assistant treasurer. And with that came managing people. Now, they were a very good non people manager. They managed their workload. They managed everything. It seemed they managed everything except for the people. And for them it was like, whoa, okay, they've gotten well with their colleagues, but suddenly they're having to go into that managerial first step and everything else. Any tips for people or. You've talked a little bit about some of your secret sauce there in a good way. But any, any other thought, Any recommendations for those guys?

I think, at least from my perspective, one of the key things is to be inclusive. And I know inclusive now has. There's a lot of definitions to it. For me it was one, obviously respecting everybody and their individuality, but being Inclusive meant having them be part of the decision making and even if they aren't part of the decision making, taking the time after to walk through. Here's what the thought process was. The only way for people at every level to grow is to understand what is the thought process. Why are we doing these things? So they can understand what were the risks that had to be contemplated and why did they choose this over that? Nobody wants to do a job where they're left out and all they're told is move something from A to B and go sit in your corner and just do that. So I feel like being inclusive, having. Just making sure they. They get a feel for what was the process, what were the things that had to be considered, what were the risks? What were the unknowns? Because in treasury, we rarely ever have all the information. We're dealing with markets and things that are moving. What led you to go down path A instead of path B? The other thing I've been doing over the years with my people is once a month we'll have what I call a learning meeting. We'll pick an hour or two and I'll say, give me a topic that you want to discuss. And it's been interest rate swaps, it's been the cross currency swap, it's been the credit facility, bits and pieces of it. I'll let them pick a topic and we'll just spend an hour or two to go. Here's why we did this and here's what the thought process. Here's where the risks are. Here's the things we've got to be looking at going in the future. For example, with the. The cross, the convertible bond, we did what's going to be coming due in a year and a half, two years. So we need to start thinking about how are we going to refinance it. Here's what we're going to want to think about. We have those sessions just so that they can continue to learn, because it's that intellectual curiosity, excuse me, curiosity I want to keep feeding so that they can stay focused, interested and feel just like they're part of it.

Brilliant. This is great. And there are a lot of treasurers out there listening, if that's the right way, and going. This is all very well for you, but how did you carve out that time? Because I get feedback and pushback from people. I'm really busy, I'm really upset. But if. Then I've also had other guests on the podcast. If you don't make time, the more you do put in paying it forward, then you get it comes back to you. Would that be the right way to describe it?

That's the way I think of it. If I don't put in that time to help them grow, to help them enjoy their job, they're eventually going to leave. And how much time is that going to cost me? So I think what I said to you before, and it's what I've said to everyone that works for me, is that one of my overriding beliefs is that my job, when I was in there, my job was to train the people that work with me to eventually take over my job. And I know there are some people that go, oh, boy, they get worried about competition coming up. And my view has always been that's insecurity. If you haven't developed yourself that you're ready now for the next level, when they're ready to take your job, then you probably, either you or your boss haven't been working enough on yourself, but you should be ready to be moving on and you should be bringing them up with you to the best that you can.

Yeah. And you then recently left, you moved on from your role and things like that. But as you were transitioning and things like that, you know, looking at all this different stuff, you. You're going to continue with treasury, as we say, having a bit of time, but you just with yourself, as you were looking at the future of treasury, looking at all these different challenges, what are the key things you may be coaching your team on, or other people when they were asking you, what are the things that you're thinking people need to think about every week, it's AI or different this or what were the things that you think people should be focusing on?

Somebody asked me that a few years ago, how do I see Treasury? And it's funny, when you get this age, I guess you do have a longer span to look back over, but I don't know that it has changed that much. Overall goal, protect the assets of the company and make sure liquidity is where you need it and when you need it, all of that really hasn't changed. What probably has been, has changed, is the speed at which we have to make decisions that probably has increased. And when I look to the future, I think the biggest challenge, because I've seen it currently, and I think it's just going to get worse, is there's going to be too much information and how to weed through to the information you really actually need. We. I think I've noticed this trend that we become too obsessed with getting as much information as possible and sometimes ignoring the cost of getting all that information, but also ignoring how that's actually muddying the waters and we don't need to do that as much as we sometimes think we do. I think we just get overloaded with information and it causes us to. What is it? Analysis by. Or paralysis by analysis. A little bit of that sometimes. And I think that's going to continue to be a challenge as we, as we go forward, is that there's just going to be so much information identifying what's critical and necessary to make the right decisions. That's going to become an even stronger challenge.

How do you do that? So I'm not saying that in a flippant way, saying, is it incumbent upon the CFO to be then giving the treasurer the sort of the list of priorities, or is that something that the treasurer needs to do? Or how would you see it?

I think it'll depend a little bit on situation. And I say that because if your CFO has come from the treasury world, then there's already a foundation there of understanding and then you can dig more into what specifically do we think is critical if they have come more from the accounting world. Let's be honest, treasury is very different from the accounting side. I've been on both and they're very different there. I think the treasurer has to take a bigger role in deciding what's critical and then making the proper case to the CFO and helping them focus. Because our job is to make them look good. Right. That's another rule. That's what my father always taught me. Your job, no matter what your role, is to make your boss look good.

Yeah, nice.

But we have to take probably a bigger role in that second situation of deciding or helping form what's critical and educating and moving forward and then also being willing at times to go, okay, this is really what you want, than swallowing our ego a little and going, fine, let's do it that way and let's do it the best we can that way.

And without wishing to rehash, but I'm going to rehash a little bit. I was recently interviewed by a couple of magazines and I've said this a couple of other times that. And it will come and come into this some. One of the questions I was asked is like, what do you think the role of a treasurer within organizations will be going forward? And I said, look, that's down to maybe the management, maybe the company, but also critically, the cfo. And they said, oh. And then you very point out there that if the CFO was perhaps has a lot of exposure to treasury, then treasury gets a better seat at the table versus some CFOs. And I was actually shared a story that there was a US Treasurer that I'm still talking to. Fun enough. He was saying for many years, Mike, I'm really happy, loving my job, great boss, really understands treasury, lets me get on, let me be an entrepreneur, visionary, go out and do stuff and everything else. And a new CFO walked in the door and look, my, my view of treasury, correct me if I'm wrong, is that you look after the cash. Right. It's like, yeah, that's part of what I do. Yeah, great. And literally the next day I got the phone call, here's my resume. I'm like, whoa, okay. So, yeah, I won't confidentially say who, but have you seen that yourself with over your career because you've got this great experience to get that aerial view from you, if you like.

I would say I've absolutely. That, yes, it's. The treasurer's role is. Is interesting and it's very different at every company, I find. But the way we're perceived, I think also differs. And I've had that where I've felt very much a partner. I was in on things before most other departments were helping, whether it was M and A or just operationally getting. Being able to counsel on the decisions earlier. And then I've had the other areas where it's been, you manage cash, go off to the side there and do that and let the rest of us manage the business sort of things. And that's unfortunate because I do think, and where I wish I had probably a better skill was to better demonstrate in treasury that we are business people, not just kind of cash people. And we, I, because of all the different areas we touch and all the things we see, I think we have a lot more information and knowledge, real time of what's going on in the company than I think some CFOs and others realize. We're there doing letters of credit and guarantees and all these things for or hedging for deals in process that are going to happen. So we're seeing things real time and we're understanding what the risks are and why they're doing it. And I don't think that a lot of other parts of the business see that like we do.

Yeah.

And I just think we have to do. And I wish I had done a better job of making it clear that we are business people that also Take care of the cash and manage risks.

And when you say that again, as you say some CFO ask you to do that and let's take that as an example. So a CFO will want you to look at blockchain, look at AI maybe but look at green initiatives, a lot of things or supply chain plans, all those different topic areas. What are the ones you think that currently we're recording this middle of 2024. What are the key ones you think that treasurers CFO should be thinking about?

That's a good question and I'm not sure I have a great answer to that.

They've all been good answers so far.

The, everything you mentioned are things that I already consider that we look at. So I, I won't tell you my views on supply chain finance because that, that one bankers hate me for that. But we get into all of that and I think, I just think that sometimes I've been involved and I've made my opinion known on whether I think we should be on pricing, for example, knowing that we are selling into some countries that are higher risk and yet we're not adjusting our pricing to reflect the increased risk. I think there are all sorts of things that we in treasury have valid opinions and ideas on and we just have to do a better job of making sure they get heard. There's no one thing. I think there's all the risks that a business faces are really in some way related tangentially to treasury, if not directly.

Yeah, I think it's brilliant and it's an interesting one for me having back in the day when treasury was this specialist area and I think treasury let was his own worst enemy in a way got itself put in a corner the corner office and we'll manage your cash and everything else. And then it spent certain companies 20 years trying to get back out of that and be mainstream with the business as well. And you and I have talked about this and, and I think it's done a blooming good job of it in recent years. Do you think the same?

I, I think it's. I think we're doing better. I think, I think there's still some work to be done there. I, even when I look at CFO roles being that are being posted on LinkedIn and or other places the focus a lot there is still on the accounting side and I find that interesting because I, and, and, and not wrong but just interesting. But I, I just feel like treasury, we've got to continue putting it out there that we are business people and we just as qualified really in my mind more qualified than perhaps other areas and should be up for consideration for those positions as well.

Okay. We keep our show to under the 40 minutes or thing we're about 35 so we will put your LinkedIn details in the show notes so that people can connect to you and grow their networks. Just looking maybe a takeaway piece of advice. I know when we had our pre podcast you would very much and I really love the conversation we're saying about training those people to take home to be better than yourself and everything else or what are the takeaways you would give and pieces of advice that people are sitting there having a coffee today thinking this is. Yeah, this is what Greg said I should do that or what Maybe for individuals or for them as leaders. What are you thinking?

I think as individuals in treasury and growing a career and this is again, I have always been more of a generalist so I've wanted to do. I'd rather know a little bit about all the different parts of Treasury. I think that helps as you grow your career because when you become an assistant treasurer or a treasurer, suddenly you do have to know all those different areas. And so by already showing that interest from the start of your career, I think that will help you because you don't know. I do believe there's some luck involved in all our careers. There has been in mine. And the luck is when does a position open? When is that opportunity there? The skill is making sure you're already ready for that opportunity. And so I think that's why I would recommend people just have a lot of intellectual curiosity, not just in your area but in the other areas around you. So when an opportunity presents itself, you've already at least laid some of the groundwork to be ready for it. Yeah.

Positioning yourself for that success.

Correct. Correct. I think that's. I think that's just important. That's my personal view as I've always thought being a generalist helps it because as a treasurer we cover so many different areas. You can't afford to only know cash management, but you really don't know capital markets or you don't know insurance risk versus currency risk, all those different things. So I think there it helps to be a generalist. And I, and I think the other one, and we mentioned it earlier, is no one cares about your career more than you. So own it. Take. People want to help you, but they need to know what your interests are and what you're hoping to achieve and also be open to switching that path down the Road. As you learn more and become more aware of what's available, I think it's great.

I think that's also. That's something I've heard as a takeaway on a lot of our treasury career corner lives. So I interview these treasurers on the panels and things, and I'm then at the front of the room with two, three, maybe four successful treasurers. And the fantastic thing is they're saying exactly what you're saying and I'm pointing to them, and it's just Tony Robinson. Success leaves clues. And this is what I'm saying, guys, these guys have taken control of their careers, They've been advocates for themselves and they're at the front of the room. If you want to get up here, this is what you need to do, so. That's exactly right. So, yeah. Wow. So, thank you, sir. I knew it'd be great fun. We'll put your details in the show notes. And thanks very much for your time today. It was just as fun as I thought it was going to be.

Thank you for having me, Mike. It was a good time.

Thank you, sir. Thanks for tuning into another great episode. You really enjoy it. Thank you very much. You make it worthwhile, us recording them with these amazing treasury professionals right away, across the world, from the us, across the uk, across Europe, and there's lots more exciting guests to come and lots more live events. We love delivering this content. We get asked now, is this what you do? Do you just do content? You just do. No. The reason we do the content is to get to know you guys, to give you back the tips for success, if you like. But we're here to help you hire someone. If you need to recruit, call us. Because at our heart, we are a Treasury recruitment company. That's how we pay the bills, that's how we pay for the podcast, and that's what we're passionate about. We hear from you at events and things. Can we also help you find your next great role? Can we help you hire? The answer is yes, that's exactly what we do. Yes, we do our treasury salary survey@treasurysalary.com that helps us know exactly how to benchmark not only your salary, but also when you're looking to hire. We know exactly what the market is paying, wherever you might be, whether it's the us, UK or Europe. We want to make sure that we are the best informed, that we're not just finger in the air. We always know. If you want to hire the best in treasury, don't hesitate to contact us. Go onto the website treasuryrecruitment.com or in the US you can contact Joe Grabowski Europe Contact the lovely Katie for more senior roles and roles across the uk. Reach out and contact me or drop any of us an email Joe@treasuryrecruitment.com Katie treasuryrecruitment.com or Mike treasurerecruitment.com Let us help you make the hiring process as amazingly seamless and easy as our podcasts are to listen to. Thanks for your amazing support and looking forward to seeing you at either an event or a conference very soon. Or just give me a call. Let's help you find the next role or recruit the next treasury professional. All right, until next week. Movie thanks.

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