Angel Oak Mortgage REIT, Inc.

Ladies and Chairman, good morning and welcome to the Angel O Mortgage First Quarter 2024 Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. A brief question and answer session will follow the formal presentation. If anyone should require operator assistance during the conference, please press star and zero on your telephone keypad. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. It is now my pleasure to introduce your host, Casey Kelleher, Head of Corporate Finance and Investor Relations. Please go ahead, sir.

Good morning. Thank you for joining us today for Angel Oak Mortgage REIT's first quarter 2024 earnings conference call. This morning, we filed our press release detailing these results, which is available in the Investors section of our website at www.angeloakreit.com. As a reminder, remarks made on today's conference call may include forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to differ materially from those discussed today. We do not undertake any obligation to update our forward-looking statements in light of new information or future events. For a more detailed discussion of the factors that may affect the company's results, please refer to our earnings release for this quarter and to our most recent SEC filings. During this call, we will be discussing certain non-GAAP financial measures. More information about these non-GAAP financial measures and reconciliations to the most directly comparable GAAP financial measures are contained in our earnings release and SEC filings. This morning's conference call is hosted by Angel Oak Mortgage REIT's Chief Executive Officer, Srini Prabhu, Chief Financial Officer, Brandon Filson, and Angel Oak Capital's Chief Investment Officer, Namit Sinha. Management will make some prepared comments, after which we will open up the call to your questions. Additionally, we recommend reviewing our earnings supplement posted on our website, www.angelokereit.com. Now, I will turn the call over to Sreeni.

Thank you, Casey, and thank you to everyone on the call for joining us today. The first quarter of 2024 reflected a continuation of the upward trajectory that we established last year. Based on the momentum from 2023, we have executed another strategy to grow and fortify our portfolio's earnings potential and return profile. The first quarter of 2024 marks our third consecutive quarter of increased net interest income, reflecting our commitment to strategic portfolio expansion and consistent securitization execution in conjunction with sound risk management. Additionally, distributable earnings, gap book value, and economic book value all increased versus both the prior quarter and the first quarter of 2023. We have established this positive growth trend despite what continues to be an uncertain and at times unfavorable macro environment. This underscores the resilience of both our operating model and of the Angel Oak ecosystem, which is market-leading origination and securitization platforms combined to position the company for continued financial success throughout the remainder of the year and beyond. In the quarter, we achieved net interest income of $8.6 million, a 26% expansion versus the same quarter last year and the highest level since the third quarter of 2022. This is enabled by our effective securitization strategy and methodical purchases of high-quality current coupon loans on balance sheet. Notably, after quarter end, we led AOMT 2024-4 securitization which was a $300 million deal with a weighted average coupon of 7.4%. We are at work purchasing newly originated loans with the proceeds from this deal, which we expect to drive further net interest income expansion in the coming quarter. This strong securitization execution and the ability to strategically leverage AngelLock ecosystem serves as a competitive advantage in the market. and further highlight the growth potential of our business model. As we continue to prioritize long-term value creation, we note that our GAAP book value per share grew to $10.55, a 2.8% increase over the previous quarter, and economic book value per share grew to $13.78, a 1.8% increase over the previous quarter. While our portfolio value is impacted by federal funds rate decisions, interest rate, market volatility, and the impact on fixed income yields, the position of our portfolio in current market coupon loans dampens some of this volatility. Though the magnitude and the timing of potential federal funds rate decreases remains uncertain, we maintain a positive outlook for the remainder of 2024. As for credit performance, the weighted average 90-plus day delinquency rate across our portfolio of whole loans, securitized loans, and RMBS was 1.8% as of quarter end, as compared to 2.2% at the end of the fourth quarter of 2023, representing a decrease of approximately 18%. We continue to observe muted delinquency activity and believe that any future upticks in delinquencies would represent a movement towards historical averages as opposed to a large-scale event as previously stated we believe that the credit risk management is a key competitive strength due to our relationship with the angel ecosystems affiliated mortgage originator which provides us the ability to adjust credit offerings based on our specific desired characteristics credit performance is a risk we choose to own and we expect our portfolio to continue to perform comparably well. With that, I'll turn it over to Brandon, who will walk us through the financial performance for the first quarter in greater detail.