Valley National Bancorp

Good day and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the fourth quarter of 2021 Valley National Bank 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 this session, you'll need to press star 1 on your telephone. I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, Travis Land, Head of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Good morning, and welcome to Valley's fourth quarter 2021 earnings conference call. Presenting on behalf of Valley today are CEO Ira Robbins, President Tom Iadanza, and Chief Financial Officer Mike Hagedorn. Before we begin, I would like to make everyone aware that our quarterly earnings release and supporting documents can be found on our company website at valley.com. When discussing our results, we refer to non-GAAP measures which exclude certain items from reported results. Please refer to today's earnings release for reconciliations of these non-GAAP measures. Additionally, I would like to highlight slide two of earnings presentation and remind you that comments made during this call may contain forward-looking statements relating to Valley National Bank Corp and the banking industry. Valley encourages all participants to refer to our SEC filings, including those found on form 8K, 10Q and 10K for complete discussion of forward-looking statements. With that, I'll turn the call over to Ira Robbins.

Thank you, Travis. And welcome to those of you on the call. As usual, I will provide some big picture thoughts before I turn the call over to Mike to discuss this quarter's results in more detail. In the fourth quarter of 2021, Valley reported net income of $115 million, earnings per share of 27 cents, and a return on average assets of 1.08%. Exclusive of merger charters, our EPS and ROA would have been 28 cents and 1.14% respectively. These adjusted metrics include approximately one cent per share of after-tax provision associated with the non-PCD loans acquired from the Westchester Bank. We generated net income of $474 million and adjusted net income of $488 million in 2021. Adjusted net income was up nearly $86 million, or 22% from 2020. These exceptional financial results reflect the execution of our strategic initiatives surrounding organic growth, credit preservation, and positive operating leverage. We generated organic loan growth, exclusive of PPP and acquisitions, of over 9% during the year. Growth was strong across our markets, reflecting contributions from both legacy value associates and new hires. Loan production was funded by low-cost core deposits, which continued to increase across geographies and business segments. Last quarter, I spoke about our ongoing evolution to a leading regional bank. While I won't rehash those comments, I want to reiterate that today's banking landscape offers tremendous opportunity for a service-oriented bank like Valley. The recent acquisition of the Westchester Bank and the pending acquisition of Bank Leumi will enhance our competitive position and ability to capitalize on this opportunity. These partners will bring us new business capabilities and access to geographies that will enhance our competitive position and support our growth targets. By the end of 2022, Value Boot will be well over $50 billion in assets with a high-quality, core-funded balance sheet and strong capital position. In today's banking landscape, this is a very unique value proposition. With that said, the exceptional progress that we have made as a standalone entity should not be overlooked. Our adjusted 2021 ROA of 1.18% is nearly 40 basis points above our 2017 level. This improvement was not dependent upon reserve releases. Rather, it is the result of net interest margin stability and consistent profitable organic growth. As I think back on 2021, I'm proud of our ability to navigate COVID uncertainty early on. During the year, we recognized a mere $15 million of net charge-offs, equating to just five basis points of average loans. This incredible result is a testament to our lending and credit culture. I'm equally proud of our ability to quickly pivot to an offensive position, which enabled us to generate significant organic loan growth and identify ideal merger partners during the year. Looking ahead, I expect 2022 to be about execution. Execution on the integration of our acquisitions, but perhaps as importantly on the organic growth opportunities that exist for us. As a relationship-focused commercial bank, we strive to be consistently in tune with our clients' financial needs. This has been a key driver of recent originations and will continue to support our organic growth going forward. With significant M&A and technology disruption around us, there is an increasing pool of potential new clients, which will provide an additional growth lever for Valley. We are excited by the team we have in place, and are confident they have the right support and technology to capitalize on these opportunities. With that, and I'll turn the call over to Mike to discuss some of the quarter's financial highlights.