SL Green Realty Corp

Thank you, everybody, for joining us, and welcome to NSO Green Realty's Corp. Fourth Quarter 2021 Earnings Results Conference Call. This conference call is being recorded. At this time, the company would like to remind listeners that during the call, management may make forward-looking statements. You should not rely on forward-looking statements as predictions of future events, as actual results and events may differ from any forward-looking statements that management may make today. All forward-looking statements made by management on this call are based on their assumptions and beliefs as of today. Additional information regarding the risk uncertainties and other factors that could cause such differences to appear are set forth in the Risk Factors and MD&A sections of the company's latest Form 10-K and other subsequent reports filed by the company with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Also, during today's conference call, the company may discuss non-GAAP financial measures as defined by Regulation G under the Securities Act. The gap financial measure most directly comparable to each non-gap financial measure discuss and a reconciliation of the differences between each non-gap financial measure and the comparable gap financial measure can be found on both the company's website at www.slgreen.com. By selecting the press release regarding the company's fourth quarter 2021 earnings, and in our supplemental information filed with our current report on Form 8K relating to our fourth quarter 2021 earnings. Before turning the call over to Mark Holliday, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of SL Green Realty Corp., I ask that those of you participating in the Q&A portion of the call to please limit your questions to two per person. Thank you. I will now turn the call over to Mark Holliday. Please go ahead, Mark.

Thank you, and good afternoon, everyone. Before we begin, I want to express our sincere condolences and deep sympathies to the families of Officers Rivera and Mora, who gave their lives in the line of duty. At SL Green, we work hand-in-hand with the NYPD, FDNY, and other first responders, and we support their efforts in every way we can, day after day. There's an outpouring of support at St. Patrick's Cathedral right now, and there will be more in the coming days and weeks as the new administration works with the state to make public safety the number one priority in the city. Everyone has a role to play, and I'm confident we can and will move forward from this. Now we appreciate the opportunity to discuss with you our company performance and financial results for the fourth quarter and full year 2021. After a solid December, in the office market. We had a bit of a reset in January, which is not atypical after the holidays, but most businesses in our portfolio expressed their intentions to return to the office in February, and by March, we expect to be back at the same levels we saw in December, if not beyond that. The Omicron virus seems to be dissipating as fast as it arrived, and we are hopeful that February, we will begin to return to normal. Those questioning the ability of New York City to rebound need look no further than the resurgence in 2021 of the residential markets, which saw record high-end condo sales and 1% vacancy in rental apartments as young people returned to the city. Our newly completed rental project at 7 Day Street supports this thesis, as we have now signed leases for over 100 units at average rents just shy of $100 per square foot. On the employment front, New York City added another 8,000 office-using jobs in December, bringing the total December to December job gain to 61,000 new jobs. We have now regained just over half of all office-using jobs lost during the early days of the pandemic, and there are approximately 50,000 additional jobs forecasted to be created in 2022, which should help to begin to reduce office vacancy rates in Manhattan. And in some of the submarkets, we've already started to see those contraction. We remain optimistic about hitting our ambitious leasing goals for 2022 on the heels of signing 250,000 square feet of office leases after our December investor conference. And notwithstanding, having grown our pipeline to almost 1.3 million square feet today from just about 1,050,000 square feet in the beginning of December. Positive takeaway is that companies continue to see the office as the central and necessary hub of business activity and are making long-term commitments and expansions within the portfolio that vastly outnumber contractions. It will take some more time to work through the system and get past the disruption of the pandemic, but with the new mayor, the new governor, and the business community all coming together and playing significant roles in the recovery of the city, We have every expectation of a rapid recovery and another demonstration of New York's extraordinary resiliency. Seven weeks ago, we hosted our December investor conference at One Vanderbilt, and we did a deep dive into our goals, objectives, and expectations for 22, which we reaffirm as we sit here today. As usual, we covered a lot of our 2021 accomplishments. which I think we're a sector leading in New York in many different respects of leasing, transactions, operational performance, and contribution to the city in the form of openings of the summit, Le Pavillon, and other things that turned out to be extraordinary successes and I think demonstrated the leadership we have and commitment we have to this market. And, you know, accordingly, as is our custom for the January call, we're going to go right into the Q&A and get questions as everything we talked about in December is still relatively fresh and happy to address anything we covered then or anything new as a result of the release we put out last night. So with that, we'll turn it over for some Q&A.

Ladies and gentlemen, to ask a question, you will need to press the start and the one key on your touchdown telephone. To withdraw your question, press the pound key. In the consideration of time, we ask that you please limit yourself to one question and one follow-up. Please stand by while we compile the Q&A roster. Now, first question coming from the line of Michael Lewis with True Securities. Your line is open.