Vornado Realty Trust

Good morning and welcome to the Vornado Realty Trust third quarter 2023 earnings call. My name is Rocco and I will be your operator for today's call. This call is being recorded for replay purposes. All lines are in a listen only mode. Our speakers will address your questions at the end of the presentation during the question and answer session. At that time, please press star then one on your touch tone phone. Now I will turn the call over to Mr. Steve Borenstein, Senior Vice President and Corporation Counsel. Please go ahead.

Welcome to Vernado Realty Trust's third quarter earnings call. Yesterday afternoon, we issued our third quarter earnings release and filed our quarterly report on Form 10-Q with the Securities and Exchange Commission. These documents, as well as our supplemental financial information packages, are available on our website, www.vno.com, under the Investor Relations section. In these documents and during today's call, we will discuss certain non-GAAP financial measures. Reconciliations of these measures to the most directly comparable GAAP measures are included in our earnings release, Form 10-Q, and financial supplements. Please be aware that statements made during this call may be deemed forward-looking statements and actual results may differ materially from these statements due to a variety of risks, uncertainties, and other factors. Please refer to our filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including our annual report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2022, for more information regarding these risks and uncertainties. The call may include time-sensitive information that may be accurate only as of today's date. The company does not undertake a duty to update any forward-looking statements. On the call today from management for our opening comments are Stephen Roth, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, and Michael Franco, President and Chief Financial Officer. Our senior team is also present and available for questions. I will now turn the call over to Stephen Roth.

Thank you, Stephen. Good morning, everyone. I begin by joining with the citizens of the free world by saying that we are shocked and saddened by the now two wars in Ukraine and Gaza. The loss of life and destruction is heartbreaking, but the importance of the outcome of these hostilities to our way of life cannot be overestimated. The President of the United States issued an elegant, simple one-word warning to potential combatants, don't. Domestically, we support Mark Rowan in his fight to right the wrongs at the University of Pennsylvania. A great many American college campuses have similar issues. The economy has held up better than expected in the face of the Federal Reserve's historic interest rate increases. But make no mistake, in the end, the Fed will slow the economy and will win its battle against inflation. Real estate capital markets remain challenged, read frozen, making it extremely difficult to finance or sell assets. Capital is scarce and back-breakingly expensive. While these circumstances will cause pain in the short term, They lay the foundation for a recovery in fundamentals and values in the future. The direct byproduct of the lack of availability and out-of-sight high cost of financing is that it will shut down almost all new building. If history is our guide, as demand recovers, the market will tighten and Class A rents and values will benefit enormously. We have seen this movie before. Despite the difficult markets, our business continues to perform well and on plan for the year. Michael will cover the math and give color in a moment. As we enter the fourth quarter, we are excited that the construction phase of Penn II is nearing completion. As expected, tenant interest is picking up in this unique redevelopment as we get closer to delivery. Over the next several quarters, we will launch many new food and beverage offerings in the Penn District, and will open a new three-line public plaza on 33rd Street, all of which will significantly enhance the tenant experience. Demolition of Hotel Pennsylvania is now complete. Our focus now is on leasing, especially Pen 1, Pen 2, and the remainder of the Farley retail, all of which will drive our near-term growth. And we remain focused on protecting our balance sheet and pushing out maturities. In the current events category, three weeks ago Wegmans opened their 90,000 square foot supermarket in the West Village at our 770 Broadway property. This is their first store in Manhattan and New Yorkers are appreciating their unique offering, crowding the store with lines around the block. It's a terrific success. In August, we contributed our Pier 94 leasehold to a joint venture with our partners Hudson Pacific and Blackstone. and in return will own 50% of the venture. This will be the best studio facility in New York City and the only purpose-built one in Manhattan. We appreciate the mayor's and New York City EDC's support in completing this important private-public partnership. We broke ground last week and expect to deliver the project by the fourth quarter of 2025. We believe in the project's potential and expect it to generate at least a very attractive 10% incremental cash yield on our investment. To conclude, as I've said before, we believe in the great American cities and especially New York. We believe that the future of work will principally be in the office. I can't imagine millions of American office workers working at home alone at their kitchen tables. We observe that New York City is back. Usage in our office buildings is now 65%. You can feel the energy if you walk the streets and stand in our lobbies. The restaurants and stores are packed, and our buildings are pretty much back to normal Monday through Thursday. The key is that talent wants to be here. It remains the number one city for college graduates from practically every region of the country. Now to Michael to cover our financials and the markets.