New York Mortgage Trust, Inc.

on reducing our exposure to multifamily joint venture equity investments, which represent less than 5% of the company's cap allocation or less than 1% of portfolio assets at the end of the quarter. However, as exposure to JV equity approaches zero and allocations to agency RMBS increases, we expect book value volatilities to subside. With the company's current liquidity, we are focused on moving from the volatility caused by our JV equity book to prudently grow the company's balance sheet for income growth in the year. In the first quarter, we continue to favor short-duration residential credit in the form of BPL bridge loans and an agency RMBS with $608 million of acquisitions. Nick will touch more on this later, but we see excellent risk-adjusted returns within these sectors in an economy that could be potentially facing an inflection point. The Fed's chair's surprised dovish comments late in Q4 is certainly now in the distant past. The market has repriced the rate curve in the first quarter. The five-year Treasury yield has retraced some of the steady declines witnessed late last year by jumping from 3.9% to 4.2% in the first quarter. The market anticipated six rate cuts in 2024 starting in March, which has given way to less than two cuts now, with the first cut expected only later in the year. Contending with these assumptions was surprisingly low first quarter GDP rent. U.S. growth has slowed from nearly 5% over six months ago to 1.6% today. The result would have been far worse if not for the U.S. economy dipping into personal savings. Holding the savings rate steady from the prior quarter of 3.6% would have resulted in a GDP print of approximately 50 basis points. Consumer expenditure drawing on savings coupled with record credit card debt utilization is not sustainable method of continuing GDP growth. Also, I wanted to quickly point out that the BEA's release of the year-over-year core PC, which is the Fed's preferred inflation measure, jumped up slightly in March. The story is not the magnitude, but the fact that it's going in the wrong direction. However, looking deeper into the result, the increase in price was predominantly related to the service sector, which is an imputed number. Observable durable goods prices were lower in the month. which could provide better insight into the future core PCE expectations. In either case, the final 80 base points to meet the Fed's inflation target of 2% is proving to be sticky and the market is adjusting to this issue. We believe the economy is signaling potential late stage cycle conditions. We expect slow to moderate growth for the rest of the year and increasing the risk of recession. In response, we continue to take a balanced approach to opportunities by intentionally lowering credit exposure or by avoiding identifiable risks. We believe the fixed income investments, particularly short-duration mortgage credit, agency RMBS, continue to provide compelling returns within this economic backdrop. Focusing on these assets have led to a 35% first quarter year-over-year increase in adjusted interest income at the company. After seasonality effects, which typically depress market activity in Q1, we are focused on increasing interest income to portfolio growth to drive earnings. We expect to deploy the company's excess liquidity of $402 million into this higher rate environment. At this time, I'll pass the call over to Christine for additional comments on our financials and then to Nick for portfolio management discussion. Christine.

Thank you, Jason. Good morning. Today, I will focus my commentary on the main drivers of first quarter financial results. Our financial snapshot on slide 11 covers key portfolio metrics for the quarter. And slide 25 summarizes the financial results for the quarter. As Jason just covered, the company had undepreciated loss per share of 68 cents in the first quarter as compared to undepreciated earnings per share of 37 cents in the fourth quarter. Our earnings were impacted by our recognition of 56 cents per share of losses, primarily on certain multifamily real estate assets held by JV Equity Investments due to a decrease in the estimated fair value of the real estate as compared to the carrying costs, and the reclassification of one of our JV equity investments and multifamily properties from held for sale to held in use. We had net interest income of 17.9 million, a contribution of 20 cents per share, up from 19 cents per share in the fourth quarter. Our quarterly adjusted interest income a non-GAAP financial measure increased by $5.6 million to $78.1 million in the first quarter, from $72.5 million in the fourth quarter. The increase is due to the growth in our interest-earning assets resulting from $608 million in investments made in agency RMBS and short-duration business purpose loans. The increase in adjusted interest income was offset by a $2.9 million increase in adjusted interest expense due to the financing of investments made during the quarter. Our interest rate swaps continue to benefit our portfolio, reducing our adjusted interest expense by 8.3 million during the quarter. Overall, the operations of our consolidated multifamily JV properties contributed a net loss of 18 cents per share during the quarter, an increase from a net loss of eight cents per share in the fourth quarter. The increase in net loss is a result of one, an increase in depreciation expense related to operating real estate as a result of the reclassification of certain multifamily real estate assets owned by entities in which we have a JV equity investment from held for sale to held in use at the end of the fourth quarter. Second, An increase in lease intangible amortization due to a consolidation of a preferred equity investment at the end of the fourth quarter. And a decrease in income from real estate due to the full quarter impact of the deconsolidation of two multifamily real estate assets and as a result of non-recurring income recognized in the fourth quarter related to earnest money proceeds received from a canceled sale. As mentioned earlier, During the quarter, we recognized 50.8 million or 56 cents per share of losses related to the following. First, a 36.2 million or 40 cents per share loss from impairment charges on real estate due primarily to lower net operating income estimates and wider cap rates resulting in lower property valuations as compared to our carrying costs. And second, a 14.6 million or 16 cents per share loss related to the reclassification of our multifamily properties from held for sale to held in use as of March 31, as it no longer met the criteria to be held for sale in conformity with GAAP. We continue to market for sale our JV equity investments in three multifamily properties, but we can provide no assurance of the timing or success of our ultimate exit from these investments. The fair value changes related to our investment portfolio continue to have a significant impact on our earnings, During the quarter, we recognized $39.4 million, or $0.43 per share of unrealized losses due to lower asset prices, primarily in our agency RMBS portfolio, as a result of increases in interest rates. These losses were offset by $0.54 per share in gains, recognized on our derivative instruments, primarily consisting of interest rate swaps and caps. We also recognized $10.5 million, or 12 cents per share of realized losses related to the sale of certain non-performing and performing residential loans and losses incurred on foreclosed properties due to lower valuations during the first quarter. We had total GNA of 13.1 million, up from 11.7 million in the previous quarter, primarily due to non-recurring professional fees and consulting fees incurred during the quarter. We had portfolio operating expenses of $11.3 million, which increased primarily due to debt issuance costs related to securitizations issued during the quarter that were expenses incurred as a result of the fair value option election of the CDOs issued, and increased expenses related to asset management of our BPO Bridge portfolio. Adjusted book value per share ended at 11.51, down 9% from year end. The main drivers of our adjusted book value change were 75 cents in basic loss per share, a reduction of 20 cents per share related to our declared dividend, and a negative 12 cents per share change in estimated fair value for amortized cost liabilities. As of quarter end, the company's recourse leverage ratio and portfolio recourse leverage ratio increased to 1.7 and 1.6, respectively. from 1.6 and 1.5 respectively as of December 31. While our financing leverage remains low relative to historical levels, we would expect our leverage to move higher as we continue to expand our holdings of highly liquid agency RMBF. Our portfolio recourse leverage on our credit book is down 0.3 times when compared to 0.4 times from the previous quarter. Due to the completion of two securitizations this quarter, of which a portion of the proceeds were used to replace recourse repurchase financing. Consequently, our debt subject to mark-to-market margin calls reduced to 56% from 58% the prior quarter. The remaining 44% of our debt as of March 31 has no exposure to collateral repricing by our counterparties. You paid a 20 cent per common share dividend unchanged from the prior quarter. We continue to evaluate our dividend policy each quarter and look at the 12 to 18-month projection of not only our net interest income, but also realized gains, realized or capital gains that can be generated from our portfolio. We remain committed to maintaining an attractive current yield for our shareholders. However, we expect undepreciated earnings per share to remain below the current dividend as we continue to rotate excess liquidity for reinvestment. in a more attractively priced market. I will now turn it over to Nick to go over the market and strategy update. Nick?

Thank you, Christine.