Stellar Bancorp, Inc.

followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. If you would like to withdraw your question, press star one again. I will now hand today's call over to Courtney Therrett, Chief Accounting Officer. Please go ahead.

Good morning. Our team would like to welcome you to our earnings call for the first quarter of 2024. This morning's earnings call will be led by our CEO, Bob Franklin, and CFO, Paul Ege. Also in attendance today are Steve Retzlaff, Executive Chairman of the company, Ray Vitulli, president of the company and CEO of the bank, and Joe West, senior executive vice president and chief credit officer of the bank. Before we begin, I need to remind everyone that some of the remarks made today constitute forward-looking statements as defined in the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 as amended. We intend all such statements to be covered by the safe harbor provisions for forward-looking statements contained in the act. Also note that if we give guidance without future results, that guidance is only a reflection of management's beliefs at the time the statement is made, and such beliefs are subject to change. We disclaim any obligation to publicly update any forward-looking statement, except as may be required by law. Please see the last page of the text in this morning's earnings release, which is available on our website at ir.steller.bank, for additional information about the risk factors associated with forward-looking statements. At the conclusion of our remarks, we will open the line and allow time for questions. I will now turn the call over to our CEO, Bob Franklin.

Thank you, Courtney. Good morning and welcome to the Stellar Bank Corp first quarter earnings call. Excuse me. The Stellar Bank team remains focused on building the Stellar way. Thank you to all the Stellar team members for continuing your efforts to strengthen our bank and create shareholder value. Our aim has not moved as we continue to build capital, strengthen liquidity, and closely watch our credit. We are a community bank. That is our heritage and our culture. We work with our customers as they work with us. Higher interest rates have put a strain on existing cash flows on certain projects, depending on the timing of underwriting. We continue our efforts to identify potential challenges early. As with new projects, we look to guarantee or support additional collateral and or pay downs as we work with our customers to get through the project cycle. Our intent is to stay close to our customers and closely watch those credits. We intend to stay well reserved in the event we need to address stress. As we work with our customers and identify stress, we may see our classified list expand a bit. but it does not appear that the ultimate stress level will result in significant losses. The requirement of significant equity going into a project or the pay down over the years has allowed us to exit credits without the losses that might otherwise be expected. Our customers are also bolstered by our good markets, holding asset values, and a significant amount of capital chasing deals. Houston saw our population grow by almost 140,000 people last year, second only to Dallas-Fort Worth. We created over 100,000 new jobs last year. Our future is bright and we operate in one of, if not the best markets in the United States. We maintain a great deposit base, have good liquidity, strong capital, and good credit metrics. We understand what we need to do as the Federal Reserve fights inflation with higher interest rates. Our intention is to stay focused on the fundamentals of our roadmap of success. I will now turn over the call to Paul Aggie, our CFO.