New York Mortgage Trust, Inc.

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for standing by. Welcome to the New York Mortgage Trust first quarter 2025 results conference call. During today's presentation, all parties are in a listen-only mode. Following the presentation, the conference will be open for questions. If you have a question, please press the star followed by 11 on your touchtone phone. If you would like to withdraw your question, please press the pound key. If you're using speaker equipment, we do ask that you please lift the handset before making your selection. This conference is being recorded on Thursday, May 1, 2025. I would now like to turn the call over to Christy Musalem, Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Good morning and welcome to the first quarter 2025 earnings call for New York Mortgage Trust. A press release and supplemental financial presentation with New York Mortgage Trust's first quarter 2025 results was released yesterday. Both the press release and supplemental financial presentation are available on the company's website at www.nymtrust.com. Additionally, we are hosting a live webcast of today's call, which you can access in the events and presentation section of the company's website. At this time, management would like me to inform you that certain statements made during the conference call, which are not historical, may be deemed forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Although New York Mortgage Trust believes the expectations reflected in any forward-looking statements are based on reasonable assumptions, it can give no assurance that its expectations will be attained. Factors and risks that could cause actual results to differ materially from expectations are detailed in yesterday's press release and from time to time in the company's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Now, at this time, I would like to introduce Jason Tirano, Chief Executive Officer. Jason, please go ahead.

Good morning. Thank you for joining New York Mortgage Trust's first quarter earnings call. Joining me today is Nick Ma, President, and Christine Ario, CFO. We are happy to spend time with you this Thursday morning as we share our first quarter recap and insights into our Q2 activity. Christine will provide commentary on first quarter results, and Nick will provide an update to our portfolio positioning and focus. This was a pivotal quarter for New York Mortgage Trust. During the first quarter, a more favorable market environment provided attractive entry points, and we capitalized on these conditions by immediately increasing investment activity. We began the quarter focused on raising interest income through portfolio optimization. As the quarter progressed, we unlocked company excess liquidity, and as a result, doubled last quarter's investment pace. Consequently, we are pleased to report that reoccurring earnings in the first quarter increased to a level consistent with the company's dividend of 20 cents per share. This achievement reflects the success of the strategic portfolio restructuring initiated two years ago, where we focused on sustainably enhancing interest income through investments in high liquid agency RMBS and through short duration credit assets in the residential BPL sector. What may come as a surprise, despite high investment deployment, company excess liquidity increased in the quarter. This was accomplished by taking prompt action in January before volatility took fold when we locked in $83 million senior unsecured five-year note, followed by completing two securitizations in the BPL sector later in the quarter. Thus, after adding $1.8 billion investments, we ended the quarter with $407 million of excess liquidity, an increase of nearly 20% from the previous quarter. We are entering the second quarter from position of strength. As we continue to grow, our balance sheet primarily focused on agency RMBS to maintain liquidity. Now, given the wider spreads after quarter end, the return potential of the portfolio has increased. Nick will further elaborate on this point later. Also, over the last 12 months, we have been able to reduce our run rate G&A through operational efficiencies, which has helped support our dividend coverage. In addition, we believe there is near-term opportunity to generate additional revenue by leveraging our platform for service fee income in the year. Before I pass the call over to Christine to discuss the company's financial results, I wanted to highlight two slides from our quarterly investor supplement available on our website. Page 8 is essentially the same slide from last quarter, but it was correct to point out the interplays between federal deficit spending and trade wars back in February. Its significance surprised the macro markets with intense volatility that ensued. The trade wars could bring about a stagflationary shock, lowering consumer confidence and, with it, consumption. Inventory building in the second quarter will likely mask this effect, thus the impact may not be seen until the summer. In the REIT sector, the importance of choices made to drive earnings as far back as last year and up to this pivotal quarter for the economy cannot be understated. Reflecting some broader macro concern, the portfolio request leverage ratio at the company reduced to .5 times in Q1 from 1.1 times last quarter. Agency RMS investments are now over 50% of company assets. Backed by 20 years of experience and proven expertise in navigating distressed mortgage markets, our team has made strategic changes to capitalize and heighten investment opportunities and then market dislocation. With that said, noted on page 10 of our supplemental, we believe NYMT's equity is significantly undervalued, trading in the low to mid 60s percent of book value. Strikingly, NYMT's equity trades at a 10 percent discount to a smaller cohort of company assets of just cash and agency RMBS. With full dividend support and real growth capacity through liquidity on balance sheet, we believe MYMT shares present exceptional value, and I can tell you our entire team is motivated to demonstrate this point. At this time, we'll pass the call over to Christine to provide our first quarter financial highlights. Christine?