Byline Bancorp, Inc.

Good morning and welcome to Byline Bancorp's first quarter 2022 earnings call. My name is Emily and I will be your conference operator today. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speaker's remarks, there will be a question and answer period. If you would like to ask a question, simply press the star followed by the number one on your telephone. If you would like to withdraw your question, press star and two. If you're listening via speakerphone, please lift your handset prior to asking your question. If you require operational assistance, please press start, then zero. Please note that this conference call is being recorded. At this time, I would like to introduce Brooks Rennie, Head of Investor Relations for Byline Bancorp, to begin the conference call. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Emily. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today for the Byline Bancorp first quarter 2022 earnings call. In accordance with Regulation FD, this call is being recorded and is available via webcast on our investor relations website, along with our earnings release and the corresponding presentation slides. Management would like to remind everyone that certain statements made on today's call involve projections or other forward-looking statements regarding future events or the future financial performance of the company. We caution that such statements are subject to certain risks, uncertainties, and other factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those discussed. The company's risk factors are disclosed and discussed in its SEC filings. In addition, certain slides contain and we refer to non-GAAP measures, which are intended to supplement but not substitute for the most directly comparable GAAP measures. Reconciliation for these numbers can be found within the appendix of the earnings release. For additional information about risks and uncertainties, please see the forward-looking statement and non-GAAP financial measures disclosures in the earnings release. I would now like to turn the conference call over to Alberto Parcini, President of Byline Bancorp.

Thank you, Brooks. Good morning and welcome everyone to our first quarter earnings call. We appreciate all of you joining us this morning. With me on the call today are Chairman and CEO Roberto Arancia, Lindsay Corby, our CFO, and Mark Fusinato, our Chief Credit Officer. As is our normal practice, I'll start by walking you through the highlights for the quarter, and then pass the call over to Lindsey, who'll provide you more detail on our quarterly results before opening up the call for questions. Turning over to slide three of the deck. During last quarter's call, we mentioned that the momentum we had in 2021 would carry forward into the first quarter of 2022, and we were correct on that assessment. Notwithstanding the fact that the first quarter turned out to be one of the most volatile periods we've seen, driven by continued elevated inflation, a more aggressive response from the Fed than expected, and the challenging situation in Ukraine, we delivered excellent first quarter results. The results were driven by positive trends in several key areas. First, we had terrific loan growth during the quarter, which was in part aided by lower pay of activity and higher line utilization. Second, deposit growth continued to be strong. And third, we continued to experience outstanding credit quality, which, when combined with strong capital generation, allowed us to continue to grow the business and return capital to shareholders. All that said, we've been in this business too long to think the credit and or operating environment will always be so benign. We don't take this for granted and continue to proactively monitor our portfolio and business lines for any sign of stress. Net income for the quarter came in at $22.3 million, or $0.58 per diluted share. This was an increase when compared to the previous quarter and year-ago period. Profitability and return metrics were solid across the board. ROA came in at 135 basis points, while ROTC was 14.4%. Pre-tax pre-provision revenue was at $33.6 million, which puts our pre-tax pre-provision ROA at a robust 203 basis points, up 74 basis points from the previous quarter and essentially flat on a year-over-year basis. Revenue for the quarter came in at $78.2 million, which was a bit lower link quarter, but up 8% from the year-ago period. Moving on to the balance sheet, the first quarter saw continued growth in both loans and deposits. Loans ex-PPP increased by $339 million, or 31% annualized, and stood at $4.8 billion as of quarter end. This was the fourth consecutive quarter of very solid loan growth that culminated with loans, again, excluding PPP, growing by $915 million, or 24%, on a year-over-year basis. The first quarter for us tends to be seasonally slower. Notwithstanding, overall business activity was strong and we saw well-balanced growth across all our lending businesses. We originated $325 million in loans for the quarter, up from $280 million the prior quarter, and benefited from lower-than-expected payoffs, strong lease originations, and solid customer activity. On this latter point, we continued to benefit from customers increasing their use of their lines. as we saw utilization tick up by one percentage point to 54% from 53% last quarter, which contributed to commercial loan growth. Our government-guaranteed lending business had another quarter of strong production with $129 million in closed loans, which, as expected, was lower than the fourth quarter but up 16% on a year-over-year basis. Deposit trends continued to be favorable during the quarter. Total deposits grew by $375 million, or 30% annualized, and stood at $5.5 billion as of quarter end, a record level for the company with the growth coming primarily from money market accounts. The mix remained strong with DDAs representing 41% of balances. Deposit costs were flat on a quarter-over-quarter basis and remained at a cycle low of eight basis points. With respect to profitability, our margin contracted 15 basis points to 381 from 396 last quarter. This decline was driven primarily by lower loan fees and PPP fees. That said, our margin remains strong, both in absolute terms and relative to peers. If we exclude accretion and PPP fees, which are both not material for us at this stage, our margin declined by five to six basis points and remains in the top decile for banks our size. The combination of an asset-sensitive balance sheet and high-quality deposit-based positions as well over the next several quarters for the expected pricing rate environment. Net interest income came in at $19.4 million, up 2% from last quarter and 23% over last year. Of note, this quarter was a nice pickup in our wealth management fee income, which increased by 36% on a year-over-year basis. The balance between revenue and expenses remained well managed with our efficiency ratio coming in at just under 55% for the quarter and improving both against last quarter and the prior year. Asset quality results were very strong for the quarter. Credit metrics were solid across the board. with NPLs, NPAs, and charge-offs continuing to decline quarter over quarter in both dollar and percentage terms. Capital remained strong with a CET1 and total capital ratios of just under 11% and 14% respectively. Our financial performance and strong capital base allowed us to continue to return capital to shareholders. With the repurchase of approximately 283,000 shares of common stock, and the redemption of our Series B preferred stock on March 31st, this being in addition to our quarterly common dividend of $0.09 per share. Given the strength of the balance sheet, we believe we're well-positioned to continue to support organic growth, invest in the franchise, and return capital to shareholders. And with that, I'd like to turn the call over to Lindsay, who will provide you more detail on our results.