Camden National Corporation

Good day and welcome to Camden National Corporation's third quarter 2026 earnings conference call. My name is Lucas Penner and I will be your operator for today's call. All participants will be in listen only mode during today's presentation. Following the presentation, we will conduct a question and answer session. If you require operator assistance at any time during the call, please press star then zero. I will now turn the call over to Renée Smith, Executive Vice President, Chief Experience and Marketing Officer.

Welcome to Camden National Corporation's third quarter 2026 earnings conference call. With me today are Simon Griffiths, our President and Chief Executive Officer, and Mike Archer, our Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Before we begin, please note that today's remarks include forward-looking statements and actual results could differ materially from what we discussed on the call. You can find cautionary language about these statements in our third quarter 2026 earnings release issued this morning and in our other SEC filings. All of these materials and public filings are available on our investor relations website at camdennational.bank. Camden National Corporation trades on NASDAQ under the symbol CAC. We'll also refer to non-GAAP financial measures during these calls. These measures provide additional insight into our performance and reconciliations to GAAP are included in today's earning release. With that, I'll turn the call over to Simon.

Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you, Renée. Earlier this morning, we reported third quarter net income of $22.8 million and diluted earnings per share of 134. Compared with third quarter 2025, net income rose 8% and diluted EPS rose 7%, reflecting strong earnings momentum driven by continued execution across our core franchise. These results were driven by strong core deposit growth that led to an improved funding mix and drove 15 basis points of net interest margin expansion over the last quarter. I'm pleased to report disciplined expense management complemented this performance, even as we continue to invest in the franchise. Pre-tax pre-provision income for the third quarter rose 4% from the second quarter and 6% from a year ago to $31.2 million, reflecting stronger core operating performance and improved operating leverage. That momentum also showed in record total revenue, which rose to 68.7 million and 67.4 million in the second quarter. We ended the quarter with approximately 7.1 billion in total assets and a strong balance sheet supported by ample liquidity, solid capital and sound credit quality. This strength positions us well to support future growth across evolving market conditions. Total loans were essentially unchanged from both the prior quarter and a year ago at $5 billion. Home equity remains a notable growth driver, up 7% during the quarter and 25% year over year, reaching a high of $392 million, while residential real estate grew modestly. Commercial balances declined slightly during the quarter, reflecting payoffs and the planned exit of certain credits that no longer aligned with our portfolio objectives. During the quarter, we added four experienced commercial bankers, two covering the Massachusetts market and two in the Southern Maine market. While they are ramping up, we are encouraged by the strength of the pipelines they are building. Their decision to join Camden also speaks to the appeal of our strategy, culture, and growth prospects. We expect these additions to support commercial growth over time while we remain disciplined on structure and pricing. On the funding side, seasonal deposit inflows, strong customer retention, and new customer relationships supported deposit growth and improved our funding mix during the third quarter. Total deposits increased 5% from the second quarter and 8% from a year ago to $5.8 billion. This outstanding performance improves our balance sheet flexibility and supports future asset growth, particularly and a rising rate environment. Within our fee-based businesses, we remain focused on expanding recurring fee streams and diversifying our revenue mix. Our strategy to expand financial advisory services and deepen customer relationships is yielding positive results. Wealth and brokerage assets under administration reached $2.6 billion at the quarter end, up 10% year over year, highlighting our ability to maintain a balanced revenue mix over time. To support deeper customer relationships and more effective execution, we are investing in our data capabilities. Our early partnership with Snowflake is already changing how we operate. For example, business teams are actively using Snowflake Explorer to access customer and performance insights directly, reducing reliance on manual analysis and enabling faster, better informed decisions. This is already supporting more targeted sales outreach and demonstrating how our early adopter technology investments can improve execution, productivity, and customer engagement. In summary, the third quarter demonstrated the strength of our relationship-based model, continued progress on our growth strategy, and record year-to-date earnings. We are investing in experienced talent, deeper customer relationships, and technology capabilities that position Camden for sustainable growth. We feel good about our Q4 outlook and we believe we are well positioned for 2027. With that strategic overview, I'll turn it over to Mike to walk through the financial results in more detail.