Eagle Bancorp, Inc.

Good day. Thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Eagle Bank Corp. Incorporated's first quarter 2023 earnings conference call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question and answer session. To ask a question during the session, you'll need to press star 1-1 on your telephone. You will then hear an automated message advising your hand is raised. To remove yourself from the queue, please press star 1-1 again. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, Charles Levingston, Chief Financial Officer. Please go ahead, sir.

Thank you, Norma. Good morning. This is Charles Levingston, Chief Financial Officer of Eagle Bancorp. Before we begin the presentation, I would like to remind everyone that some of the comments made during this call may be considered forward-looking statements. We cannot make any promises about future performance, and it is our policy not to establish with the markets any formal guidance with respect to our earnings. None of the forward-looking statements made during this call should be interpreted as our providing formal guidance. Our Form 10-K for the 2022 fiscal year and current reports on Form 8-K identify certain risk factors that could cause the company's actual results to differ materially from those projected in any forward-looking statements made this morning. Eagle Bancorp does not undertake to update any forward-looking statements as a result of new information or future events or developments unless required by law. This morning's commentary will include non-GAAP financial information. The earnings release, which is posted in the investor relations section of our website and filed with the SEC, contains reconciliations of this information to the most directly comparable GAAP information. Our periodic reports are available from the company online at our website or on the SEC's website. This morning, Susan Reel, the president and CEO of Eagle Bancorp, will start us off with a high-level overview. Then Jan Williams, our chief credit officer, will discuss her thoughts on the local economy, loans, reserves, and credit quality matters. Then I'll return to discuss our financials in more detail. At the end, all three of us will be available to take questions. I would now like to turn it over to our president and CEO, Susan Reel.

Thank you, Charles, and good morning, everyone. While we are disappointed with the first quarter operating results, there are several positive items to point out. Capital, asset quality, loan growth, and expense control. First, our capital ratios continue to be strong and are well in excess of regulatory requirements. Our tangible common equity is $1.1 billion, which is 10.36% of tangible assets. This level of capital is relatively high when compared to our peers and gives us room to continue to lend. This foundation has also enabled us to continue to support our shareholders by paying a quarterly dividend and purchasing common stock. Based on last night's closing price, our current annualized dividend yield is 5.71%. And during the quarter, we repurchased 400,000 shares of common stock. On a combined basis, we returned capital of $32.2 million to our shareholders in the first quarter of the year. Second, our asset quality metrics remained strong, even against the backdrop of a challenging market. Non-performing assets as a percent of assets was eight basis points. unchanged from the prior quarter, and net charge-offs were under $1 million. Our long-standing commitment to strong underwriting and risk management has served us well during these times of economic turmoil. Additionally, we remain focused on disciplined loan growth. This quarter, we increased loans by $102 million. This was our sixth consecutive quarterly increase. thanks to the continued efforts of our CRE and CNI teams. As our clients know, we have the local expertise and we are more committed to the business community in the Washington DC market than larger banks based outside our area. We also continue to focus on controlling expenses. Our annualized non-interest expense as a percent of average assets was 1.44% this past quarter. Measured against our peers, this operating efficiency is another way that we provide value to our shareholders. For our customers, we provide value by meeting their liquidity and credit needs. At quarter end, we had an aggregate borrowing capacity of $1.7 billion. This gives us financial flexibility to provide the support and services our customers expect. Jaws will discuss our borrowing capacity in more detail later on. With that, I'll hand it over to Jan for a discussion of the market and credit quality.