Evans Bancorp, Inc.

Greetings. Welcome to the Evans Bank Corp. First Quarter Fiscal Year 2021 Financial Results Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. A question-and-answer session will follow the formal presentation. If anyone should require operator assistance during the conference, please press star zero on your telephone keypad. Please note this conference is being recorded. I will now turn the conference over to your host, Deborah Pawlowski. Please go ahead.

Thank you, and good afternoon, everyone. We certainly appreciate your interest in Evans Bancorp and for your taking the time today to join us on our call. I have here with me David Naska, our President and Chief Executive Officer, and John Connerton, our Chief Financial Officer. David and John will review our results for the first quarter of 2021, and then we will open the call for questions. You should have a copy of the financial results that were released today after markets closed. If not, you can access them on our website at www.evansbank.com. If you are aware, we may make some forward-looking statements during the formal discussion as well as during the Q&A. These statements apply to future events that are subject to risks and uncertainties as well as other factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from what is stated on today's call. These risks and uncertainties and other factors are provided in the earnings relief as well as with other documents filed by the company with the Securities and Exchange Commission. You can find those documents on our website or at www.sec.gov. With that, let me turn it over to David to begin.

Thank you, Debbie. Good afternoon, everyone. We appreciate you joining us for the call today. As we begin, I'd like to once again take this opportunity to thank all our associates for their continued outstanding efforts and ongoing commitment to support the needs of our clients and communities. It has been more than a full year now since the onset of the COVID pandemic in the U.S., and this has certainly been a difficult operating environment, but we are starting to see light at the end of the tunnel. While we're not out of the woods yet, the first quarter felt more like a typical quarter of business operations, especially considering the other significant activities that took place this past year, with two acquisitions and our headquarters move. Overall, the first quarter marked a very solid start to the year, reflecting the strength of our diverse business model, our focused actions in support of our clients and communities, and the execution of our long-term strategy. We are reporting earnings of 89 cents per diluted share on net income of $4.9 million, including a $313,000 provision primarily due to one commercial relationship. John will provide more detail, but absent that credit, we would have experienced a release of provision reflecting solid credit quality across our portfolio and continued positive macroeconomic trends. Loan and deposit levels were up significantly year over year, given the addition of Fairport Savings Bank, or FSB, and active engagement with the Paycheck Protection Program both last year and this. In fact, as part of Phase 2 of the PPP, we funded approximately 950 loans for $89 million during the quarter. The average size of a PPP loan this quarter has tended to be smaller, while 70% of the loans originated went to businesses with less than 10 employees. We estimate our work helped the businesses that received these loans protect approximately 11,000 jobs in the communities we serve. We've continued to assist many existing and new clients gained in the first round of PPP to navigate and secure funding for Phase 2. Many of those newer clients were not serviced or had been turned away by other banks in the first round. This has continued to be an important platform and opportunity for us to build and deepen relationships and ultimately offer other products and services. It is important to note that while our loan growth for the quarter of $53 million reflected the latest round of PPP funding, we did experience very healthy commercial originations of $90 million. Those originations, however, were offset by a heightened level of refinancing and payoffs, given the low rate environment and excess liquidity that exists in the market. Given the ongoing pandemic impact, we are still unable to pursue many of the activities that we would normally, such as full attendance at community events and greater in-person customer interaction. Despite the restrictions on our interactions, we are experiencing a resurgence in loan demand in both commercial real estate and C&I projects. we remain confident in our ability to drive future loan growth as our commercial pipeline is at a record level of approximately $100 million. In addition, during the first quarter, approximately 15% of our originations and a similar amount of the pipeline came from the Rochester market. Given the current operating environment, we are pleased with the progress in that market and anticipate greater traction as economic recovery further unfolds. Our strong performance, focus on capital management, and shareholder returns enabled us to increase the company's cash dividend once again, marking the 11th increase over the last nine years. A $0.60 per share per common share semiannual dividend was paid in early April, approximating a 3.5% annualized return. In support of our commitment to deliver value to shareholders, we announced in February also a renewal of our stock repurchase program, authorizing the repurchase of up to 300,000 shares of the company's outstanding common stock. Finally, regarding the investment market, based upon public analysis, it is the bank's expectation that we will, along with perhaps 80 to 90 other financial institutions, be dropped out of the Russell Stock Index upon reconstitution in May due to increased market capitalization rates for inclusion. While disappointing, we do not anticipate but will remain vigilant to any impact to our stock values from the move and will seek to continue growing our book value through operating performance. Looking ahead, while there will be lingering headwinds, we are pleased to see encouraging signs of economic recovery and positive developments with vaccinations. Currently, we anticipate having our associates return to our headquarters in early July. There is a sense of normalcy returning, as the market recovers and reopens and we get back to the basics of relationship banking. We believe we are in a strong position to continue to drive forward with our strategy and deliver performance. With that, I'll hand it over to John to run through our results, and then we'll be happy to take any questions. John?