Great Southern Bancorp, Inc.

Hello. Thank you for standing by. Welcome to Great Southern Bancorp, Inc. Second Quarter 2024 Earnings 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 the question during this session, you will need to press star 11 on your telephone. You will then hear an automated message advising your hand is raised. To withdraw your question, please press star 11 again. I would now like to turn the call over to Kelly Polonis. You may begin.

Thank you. Well, good afternoon, and thank you for joining us for our second quarter earnings call. The purpose of this call is to discuss the company's results for the quarter ending June 30, 2024. Before we begin, I need to remind you that during the course of this call, we may make forward-looking statements about future events and financial performance. These statements are subject to a number of factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from projected results. For a list of some of these factors, please see the forward-looking statements disclosure in our second quarter earnings release and our other public filings. President and CEO Joe Turner and Chief Financial Officer Rex Copeland are on the call with me. I'll now turn the meeting over to Joe.

All right. Thanks, Kelly. And good afternoon to everybody. Our second quarter results reflected improved earnings versus the first quarter of 2024, both on a reported basis and excluding the non-recurring items as we continue to operate in a challenging economic environment. For the second quarter, we earned $1.45 per diluted common share or $17 million compared to $1.52 or $18.3 million for the same period in 2023. Earnings were $1.13 per share or $13.4 million in the first quarter of 24. Excluding the non-recurring items related to the terminated core banking system conversion project and some compliance matters, earnings per diluted common share were $1.37 for the second quarter of 24. Key drivers of our performance included modest increases in overall funding costs, continued significant competition for deposits, and lower loan origination volumes. The second quarter was also the first full period without the negative impact of one of our interest rate swaps, as we discussed in previous reports. Rex will provide more color on our results in his presentation. As far as capital and liquidity, the company's capital and liquidity positions remain strong. Total stockholder's equity was $568.8 million as of June 30, 24. decreasing 3 million from the end of 23 due to increases in unrealized losses on our available for sales securities portfolio as well as our portfolio of interest rate swaps. Our capital remains substantially above regulatory well-capitalized threshold. Our TCE ratio was 9.4% at the end of June. The company declared a 40 cent per common share dividend during the second quarter and continued to repurchase shares of common stock from time to time with approximately 237,000 shares repurchased so far in 2024. In terms of liquidity, the company had available secured funding lines through the Federal Home Loan Bank and Federal Reserve along with on-balance sheet liquidity totaling approximately $2 billion. Overall, our loan portfolio is diverse and performing well. We've seen some modest growth in our portfolio with an increase of about $44 million since the end of 23. The increases are primarily in the multifamily category, which is really happening as a result of construction loans, multifamily construction loans finishing and being moved to the permanent multifamily category. At the end of 24, the pipeline of loan commitments and unfunded lines decreased to $1.1 billion including $571 million in the unfunded portion of construction loans. Overall, credit quality metrics remained strong during the quarter, with total non-performing assets remaining generally unchanged from 2024. Non-performing assets, the total assets were 34 basis points at the end of June versus 20 basis points at the end of the year. Compared to the end of 23, non-performing assets increased $8.6 million to $20.4 million at the end of June. Delinquencies in our loan portfolio remained at low levels and net charge-offs were not significant in the second quarter or first half of 24. For more information about our loan portfolio, you can find our quarterly portfolio presentation on our investor relations site under the presentations link, and it is also on file with the SEC. Our quarterly loan presentation provides a lot of helpful information regarding our loan portfolio mixed by type and geography. That concludes my prepared remarks. I'll turn the call over to our CFO, Rex Copeland, at this time.