Ally Financial Inc.

Good day and thank you for standing by. Welcome to Ally Financial's first quarter 2021 earnings conference call. At this time, all participants are in listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question and answer session. To ask a question during the session, you will need to press star then 1 on your telephone keypad. Please be advised that today's conference may be recorded. If you require any further assistance, please press star then 0. I'd now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, Daniel Eller, Head of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Operator. We appreciate everyone joining us to review Ally Financial's first quarter 2021 results. This morning, we have our CEO, Jeff Brown, and our CFO, Jen LeClair, on the call to review our results and then take questions. Before beginning, I'll note the presentation we'll reference can be found on the Ally Investor Relations website. And on slide two, you can find forward-looking statements and risk factor language that will govern today's call. And on slide three, we've included several GAAP and non-GAAP or core measures pertaining to Ally's operating performance and capital results. These metrics are supplemental to and not a substitute for U.S. GAAP measures. Definitions and reconciliations can be found.

With that, I'll turn the call over to JB. Great. Thank you, Daniel. Good morning, everyone. We appreciate you joining us. This morning, we recognize it's a busy morning with a few of us out with results, so we appreciate you being here. I'm going to begin comments on slide number four. As we convened this call a year ago, we were obviously in the early days of the COVID-19 health crisis that has taken the lives of many loved ones, altered everyday norms, and shed an unfortunate but necessary light on growing economic disparities. Today, through the diligent work In coordination across health and public sectors, vaccine rollouts are accelerating, providing increased reason for optimism in our ability to contain the spread of this deadly virus. Likewise, early signs of a broad-based economic reopening in the U.S. continue to emerge, evidenced in the outlook for strong GDP growth, ongoing gains in employment levels, and expanding consumer confidence and spending. We've also seen increased focus and action across the private sector in addressing income disparity and underlying systemic racism, even though more work remains to be done in the years ahead. Over the past many months, I've expressed the view on several occasions that Ally would successfully navigate the complex environment and emerge stronger than before by relying on a consistent set of values and executing. Ally's first quarter operating and financial results put meaning to these words, demonstrating the value we are building for all of our stakeholders as we deliver on our mission to do it right for our customers, employees, and communities. Ally's success has always been defined by our relentless customer focus and the vibrancy of our culture. Over many decades, we have built dominant, adaptable businesses within the auto and digital banking ecosystems firmly centered around our customers. Efforts to build the largest auto and digital bank platforms have underpinned significant and sustained financial improvement in enabling us to capitalize on market opportunities in real time, which Jen will talk about in detail this morning. Our purpose to help customers achieve their financial goals through seamless, innovative financial products and services is evident in everything we do and was paramount throughout the pandemic, shown in the rollout of our comprehensive relief programs and access to credit we provided to all of our consumer and commercial clients. Maintaining our culture has always been a top priority, centered around an environment of inclusivity and protecting the well-being of our employees. Over the past year, this approach has taken on a variety of new forms, including expansion of health, family, and financial benefits for our people, dynamically adjusting to virtual and hybrid work environments, and relying on our employee resource groups to facilitate crucial conversations and connect with each other as we confront the disturbing realities of systemic racism and disparate treatment among black brown, and most recently, Asian communities. I am immensely proud of how our Ally teammates have responded to each of these challenges, remaining dedicated during times of great uncertainty and instability while consistently going above and beyond to deliver for our customers. For the second year in a row, we granted all employees with 100 shares of Ally stock referred to internally as the Own It Grant. Through this action, we are acknowledging the significant contribution each of our employees continues to make while embedding an owner's mentality across the entire organization. On social and community causes, we've expanded our ability to drive impact across our leadership team and through the Ally Foundation and Office of Diversity and Inclusion. During the quarter, we marked our 15th year of partnership with the Thurgood Marshall Foundation by increasing scholarships and grant monies focused on improving access to public policy and financial service industries. Each of these critical components contributes to our ongoing success and generates long-term value for all of our stakeholders. There is excitement at Ally in the success we've generated and the path in front of us as we continue to further leverage our scale and expertise in meeting the needs of our now 9 million and growing Ally customers. Turning to slide number five, first quarter adjusted EPS of $2.09, core ROTCE of 24.1%, and revenues of $1.9 billion Each represented record-setting levels for Ally, reflecting organic and diversified revenue expansion. Within auto finance, consumer originations of $10.2 billion represented our highest level in over five years at a healthy 7.2% yield, while the credit performance remained solid. These are powerful examples of our market-leading capabilities and ability to execute on our strategic priorities. Overall demand for new and used vehicles was robust during the quarter, while competition remained balanced but intense. Industry inventory levels reached multi-decade lows as sales trends were strong, and we began to see the early impact of constrained OEM production due to chip-related shortages. These dynamics provided structural support for used car values, which remained at or near record highs. Within insurance, written premiums of $333 million moved higher year over year, and investment portfolio revenue trends remained robust. Turning to Ally Bank, the trend of organic and accelerating growth continued in the quarter. Retail deposits ended at $128 billion, including customer expansion of 14%, extending the trend of double-digit year-over-year growth every quarter since launching Ally Bank in 2009. Ally Home originations of $1.8 billion grew nearly 2.5 times compared to the prior year period. Forty-five percent of originated value was sourced from existing deposit customers, highlighting our organic opportunity to build increased scale in this core consumer bank product. Ally Invest self-directed customer assets of $14.5 billion expanded 93% year-over-year, reflecting customer inflows and market activity. The team showed resiliency and dedication in a choppy environment, generating steady customer growth and supporting historically elevated daily trading activities. Ally lending performance was strong during the quarter as we generated $211 million of volume, nearly a three-fold increase year-over-year. We expect to officially launch our retail offering here in the second quarter, enhancing our ability to sustain our momentum in this rapidly growing market. Corporate finance financial results were solid, generating strong syndication income and $1.8 billion in loan commitments, our highest first quarter ever. The outlook for each of these businesses reflects years of steady execution and ongoing discipline, which positions us to achieve our near and long-term financial and strategic objectives. On slide number six, trends on the top of the page highlight our ability to generate strong earnings and revenues and indicate the rapid resumption of the improving financial trajectory we were on entering 2020. As we've highlighted in the past, we are not overly focused on quarter-to-quarter trends, which we expect will not always move in a linear manner as our focus is centered on long-term value enhancements. On the bottom right, tangible book value per share of $36.16 increased quarter-over-quarter and year-over-year to our highest level on record. Values, culture, and disciplined execution will continue to underpin our approach as we build upon our momentum in the years ahead. Thank you, and with that, I'm going to hand it over to Jen to go through the detailed results.