Apollo Commercial Real Estate Finance, Inc

Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the second quarter 2021 Apollo Commercial Real Estate Estate Finance Earnings Conference call. I'd like to remind everyone that today's call and webcast are being recorded. Please note that they are the property of Apollo Commercial Real Estate Finance Incorporated and that any unauthorized broadcast in any form is strictly prohibited. Information about the audio replay of this call is available in our earnings press releases. I'd also like to call your attention to the customary safe harbor disclosure in our press release regarding forward-looking statements. Today's conference call and webcast may include forward-looking statements and projections, and we ask that you refer to our most recent filings with the SEC for important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from these statements and projections. In addition, we will be discussing certain nine gap measures on this call. which management believes are relevant to assessing the company's financial performance. These measures are reconciled to gap figures in our earnings presentation, which is available in the stockholders' section of our website. We do not undertake any obligation to update our forward-looking statements or projections unless required by law. To obtain copies of our latest SEC filings, please visit our website at www.apolloreit.com or call us at 212-515-3200. At this time, I'd like to turn the call over to the company's Chief Executive Officer, Stuart Rossney. Sir, please begin.

Thank you, Operator, and good morning, and thank you to those of us joining us on the Apollo Commercial Real Estate Finance Second Quarter 2021 Earnings Call. Joining me this morning, as usual, is Jay Agarwal, our CFO. The second quarter was a busy and productive one for ARI, resulting in strong earnings and a continued well-covered dividend. The company originated five first mortgage loans totaling $825 million, bringing year-to-date total originations to $1.4 billion. More importantly, the commercial real estate transaction market remains robust with real capital analytics reporting 167% increase in second quarter volume versus last year. For ARI, we continue to see a high volume of interesting opportunities as our pipeline continues to build. The diversity of the transactions closed to date once again demonstrates the depth and talents of our origination team and highlights the benefits Apollo's platform brings to ARI. Notably, the transactions secured by the German portfolio of properties and the U.S. portfolio of parking facilities were won due to our team's ability to speak for the entire loan and to be thoughtful, flexible, and efficient in underwriting and structuring. Our European lending platform continues to fire on all cylinders, winning many transactions that would otherwise historically have gone to banks. Year to date, approximately 70% of our transactions completed were loans secured by properties throughout Europe. As our platform in Europe grows and continues to expand its market presence, we have established a reputation as a reliable, innovative capital provider. Our ability to provide borrowers with a one-stop shop for large financings, as well as our responsiveness and creativity around structuring, has allowed us to compete very effectively in Europe. With respect to loan repayments, ARI continue to benefit from improving real estate fundamentals and the robust level of liquidity in the real estate capital markets. Three loans totaling approximately $260 million repaid during the quarter, including one hospitality loan and two subordinate residential for sale loans, one of which was a large New York City project and the other was a was for a condominium development in Los Angeles. Subsequent to the quarter, an additional $287 million of loans repaid as repayment activity in general is becoming more consistent with pre-pandemic expectations. Turning to the balance sheet, ARI completed an eight-year, $500 million debut offering with senior secured notes priced at 4.5%. there was significant investor interest in the transaction, which enabled ARI to both upsize the deal and tighten pricing. Consistent with our prior commentary on corporate finance strategy, we felt it was prudent to continue to term out some of our financing, access additional non-asset-specific leverage, and increase our pool of unencumbered assets, which were north of $2 billion at quarter end. Shifting to the portfolio, Credit quality generally remains stable, and we continue to make progress with our focused loans. Demolition is moving forward at the property on Fulton Street in Brooklyn, which will be developed into an approximately 50-story, 600-unit multifamily tower. Given the pace of development and the strength of the Brooklyn submarket, we reduced the original reserve against this asset by $20 million. We also continue to see positive activity at our asset in the Miami Design District. As I mentioned on our last earnings call, we signed a large lease with restoration hardware for a significant portion of the existing property. With the positive momentum in the sub-market, we believe the appropriate path towards maximum economic recovery will be through additional short-term leases while we focus on working through zoning and planning to ready the property for redevelopment as expeditiously as possible. Lastly, in Europe, the sales process on the asset underlying our Oxford Street loan is fully underway. In the second round of bidding, there were multiple credible offers in excess of ARI's loan basis, and we anticipate a sale of the asset and a full repayment to ARI before the end of the year. I also wanted to provide an update on 111 West 57th Street. The property is moving towards completion despite construction delays. We continue to see interest from potential buyers as evidenced by recent increases in foot traffic. As I have previously stated, getting the project built to spec is the first order of business for ARI, and we are confident the building is on track to be completed. Once built, The price level and pacing of sales will be the next area of focus, but the increasing level of interest in this property, along with the recent activity in the broader New York ultra luxury market, is encouraging. As we disclosed in the 10-K filed yesterday, subsequent to quarter end, there were some changes to the property's capital structure. A vehicle managed by an affiliate of Apollo transferred their junior mezzanine position to ARI, connection with this transfer, one of the property's subordinate capital providers paid the affiliate a price representing the original principal balance and agreed to forego the accrued interest on the loan. In conjunction with this transaction, ARI and the subordinate capital provider have agreed to a waterfall sharing arrangement pursuant to which rather than the company receiving interest it would otherwise have been entitled to after July 1st, 2021 on the junior mezzanine loan, proceeds received from the sale or refinance of the underlying collateral after repayment to priority lenders under the waterfall will be shared between ARI and the subordinate capital provider at an agreed upon allocation. We will continue to provide updates on the project as construction completes and sales progress. And with that, I will turn the call over to Jay to review our financial results.

Thank you, Stuart. For the second quarter, we reported strong financial results with distributable earnings prior to realized loss and impairments of $59 million, or $0.41 per share. Gap net income available to common stockholders was $64 million, or $0.42 per share. As of June 30th, our general CECL reserve remained relatively unchanged quarter over quarter. With respect to the specific CECL reserve, we reversed $20 million against our Fulton Street loan as we continue to make progress in readying the site for a multifamily tower development, as well as improvements in the Brooklyn multifamily market. We also foreclosed on a hotel asset in Washington, D.C., and recorded an additional $10 million loss bringing our total loss against that asset to $20 million. This is now reflected as a realized loss in our financial statements. GAAP book value per share prior to depreciation and general CECL reserves increased to $15.48 as compared to $15.35 to the end of the first quarter. The loan portfolio at quarter end was $7.5 billion, a 16 percent increase since the end of 2020. The portfolio had a rated average unlevered yield of 5.5 percent in a remaining fully extended term of just under three years. Approximately 89 percent of our floating rates U.S. loans have LIBOR floors that are in the money today, with a rated average floor of 1.32 percent. In addition to the five loans originated this quarter, we made $246 million of add-on funding for previously closed loans. With respect to our borrowings, we are in compliance with all covenants and continue to maintain strong liquidity. We ended the quarter with $227 million of total liquidity. Our debt-to-equity ratio at quarter end increased to 2.3 times as our portfolio migrated towards first mortgages. And lastly, as noted in the 8K we filed last week, subsequent to quarter end, we exchanged our 169,008% Series B preferred stock for 7.25% Series B1 preferred stock in the same amount. This reduces our cost by 75 basis points per annum, and the preferred stock continues to be held by a single institutional investor. And with that, we'd like to open the line for questions. Operator, please go ahead.