Brookline Bancorp, Inc.

Good day and welcome to the Brookline Bancorp fourth quarter 2020 earnings conference call. All participants will be in a listen-only mode. Should you need assistance, please signal a conference specialist by pressing star and then zero. After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. To ask a question, you may press star and then one on a touch-tone phone. To withdraw your question, please press star and then two. Please note that this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Marissa Martin. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Tom, and good afternoon, everyone. Yesterday, we issued our earnings release and presentation, which is available on the investor relations page of our website, brooklinebankcorp.com, and has been filed with the SEC. This afternoon's call will be hosted by Brookline Bancorp's executive team, Paul A. Peralt and Carl M. Carlson. Before we begin, please note this presentation is being done from several different locations, so if there is a delay or technical problem, we appreciate your patience and understanding. This call may also contain forward-looking statements with respect to the financial condition, results of operations, and business of Brookline Bancorp. Please refer to page two of our earnings presentation for our forward-looking statement disclaimer. Also, please refer to our other filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, which contain risk factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from these forward-looking statements. Any references made during this presentation to non-GAAP measures are only made to assist you in understanding Brooklyn Bancorp's results and performance trends and should not be relied on as financial measures of actual results or future predictions. For comparison and reconciliation to GAAP earnings, please see our earnings release. If you can join us on page three of the earnings presentation, I'm pleased to introduce Brookline Bancorp's president and CEO, Paul Perrault.

Thanks, Marissa, and good afternoon, everyone. As we approached the holiday season and autumn turn to winter, we saw infections and hospitalizations spike higher, and the positive trends we were seeing in Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and New York reversed themselves, as new mandates and recommendations dampened economic activity. We are very optimistic about the promise of the vaccine and the potential impact of the fiscal stimulus provided at the end of the year. Work from home continues to be the predominant theme in the cities of Boston and Providence. The health and safety of our employees and their families is our top priority. With the spike in infections, we also reversed our reopening efforts and paused, encouraging non-branch employees to come into the office once or twice a week until we see a sustained decline in the rate of infections and the benefits of more widespread vaccinations becomes evident. This past year was challenging in many respects, and I would like to recognize our employees for their hard work and commitment. We had a solid quarter of earnings of $26.7 million or $0.34 per share as our credit quality remains stable and our net interest margin improved. We continue to work with a small segment of our customers who are still facing financial challenges relating to the shutdowns and may require additional loan payment deferrals to get to the other side. As I noted last quarter, we had granted 5,422 short-term deferrals on loan balances of $1.2 billion. I'm very pleased to say that as of the end of the year, there were only 298 credits totaling $90 million with loan modifications. I'm also pleased to report the Board approved another 11.5 cent dividend to stockholders, which will be paid in February, and also approved a new $10 million stock buyback program providing management with the flexibility to repurchase stock prudently when the opportunity presents itself in 2021. I will now turn you over to Carl, who will review the company's fourth quarter results. Carl?