Stewart Information Services Corporation

Hello, and thank you for joining the Stewards Information Services Fourth Quarter and Full Year 2021 Earnings Call. At this time, all participants are in listen-only mode. Later, you will have an opportunity to ask questions during the question-answer session. Instructions will be given at that time. Please note, this call is being recorded. Lastly, if you should require operator assistance, please press star zero. It is now my pleasure to turn today's program over to Nat Otis, Head of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Great. Thanks, Emma. Good morning. Thank you for joining us today for Stuart's fourth quarter 2021 earnings conference call. We will be discussing results of a release yesterday after the close. Joining me today are CEO Fred Eppinger and CFO David Heise. To listen online, please go to the Stuart.com website to access a link for this conference call. I will remind participants this conference call may contain forward-looking statements that involve a number of risks and uncertainties. Because such statements are based on the expectation of future financial operating results and are not statements of fact, actual results may differ materially from those projected. The risks and uncertainties with forward-looking statements are subject to include but are not limited to the risks and other factors detailed in our press release published yesterday evening and in the statement regarding forward-looking information, risk factors, and other sections of the company's Form 10-K and other filings with the SEC. Let me now turn the call over to Fred.

Thank you for joining us today for Stuart's fourth quarter 2021 earnings conference call. David will take you through the quarter's financial results in a minute, but before then, I would like to touch on Stuart's 2021 results and what we see in front of us for 2022 and beyond. We are now two full years into what we call the journey to become the premier title services company. 20 and 21 were two of the best as well as the most challenging years in the title industry as a whole, given tremendous changes in the market, historically low rates, and an ongoing impact and uncertainty caused by COVID. For Stewart specifically, it has been a period filled with significant change and increased focus, a focus on significant structural improvement with enhanced operating discipline and a renewed commitment to the customer experience. More remains to be done in our journey, but we are encouraged by our progress. as we have materially improved from 2019 and 21. We have significantly improved in every aspect of our business and have demonstrated our ability to materially improve our margins while significantly growing our business. We are pleased with the results in all our lines this quarter, across residential and commercial, where we have built in a strategy to take advantage of what looks like a very positive commercial market that lies ahead. We have enhanced our core business by leveraging added scale and targeted geographies, while also placing a greater focus on managing more effectively and efficiently. We have built scale and targeted services, and we continue to benefit from an influx of industry talent that T. Stewart is a destination for forward-thinking leaders, offering a significant long-term opportunity. In the area of technology, we understand that the real estate transaction will continue to evolve, becoming less paper-intensive, more remote, and more digital. As we have done with many of our recent transactions, we will continue to invest when appropriate, in technologies and services that help facilitate this change, and therefore improving the customer's ease of use and experience. While we are proud of our accomplishments to date, we recognize there is more to be done in the face of higher interest rate environment and a further evolution of the market. The long-term outlook for the residential real estate market remains encouraging. as purchase segment trends are projected to continue to be strong and demographic realities such as first-time millennial home buying add to the opportunity of an increasing favorable mix shift. That said, our industry and our company will likely need to navigate a near-term horizon of greater interest rate uncertainty as the Fed acts more aggressively to curb inflation by taking actions that may lead to further pullback of the refinancing activity. At Stewart, we have been preparing for this market transition by reconstructing a title company that is better able to sustain the ups and downs of a full real estate cycle. A key part of building a resilient foundation is the work we continue to do to gain adequate local scale and priority markets. As part of this process, we continue to opportunistically add new title agencies and teams to our Stewart family, increasing talent and leadership in those market segments along the way. Historically, Stewart has been less weighted to refinancing volumes, And as we have grown, we have looked to acquire companies and talent that align with our view of future mix. We continue to reconstruct Stewart to be resilient under all conditions by focusing on our business mix, deeper agency relationships, additional commercial opportunities, and investing in technology and operating model improvements to deliver the enhanced customer experience. Let me finish by thanking our associates for all their hard work and customers for their continued support. We are on a journey together to make the company more successful and resilient. David will now update everyone on our results.