Paul Elenio
Analyst · KBW. Your line is open
Okay. Thank you, Ivan. As our press release this morning indicated, we had a very strong third quarter with adjusted AFFO of $41.4 million, or $0.42 per share. We also produced core AFFO of $0.32 and $0.91 per share for the third quarter and nine months ended September 30, excluding a one-time litigation settlement gain and non-cash acceleration of fees and early extinguishment of debt. This reflects an annualized return on average common equity of approximately 14% for the third quarter and 13% for the first nine months of the year. These ROEs are up over 20% from the same time last year due to significant portion of our earnings that are being generated by our rapidly growing capital-light agency business and from the additional cost efficiencies we are experiencing, as we continue to scale our balance sheet business. And as Ivan mentioned, we are very pleased with our ability to continue to generate core earnings well in excess of our current dividend, which has allowed us to once again increase our dividend earlier than we expected and we remain very confident in our ability to increase our dividend in the future. Looking at our results from our agency business, we generated approximately $19 million of income in the third quarter and approximately $1.4 billion in originations and $1.2 billion in loan sales. The margin on our third quarter sales was 1.47%, including miscellaneous fees, compared to 1.53% all-in margin on our second quarter sales, and we recorded commission expense of approximately 39% on both our second and third quarter gains on sale. We also recorded $25.2 million of mortgage servicing rights income related to $1.4 billion of committed loans during the third quarter, representing an average mortgage servicing rights rate of around 1.83%, compared to 1.66% on second quarter committed loans of $1.1 billion. This was mainly due to a shift in product mix in the third quarter, resulting in higher servicing fees. Sales margins and MSR rates fluctuate primarily by GSE loan type and size. Therefore, changes in the mix of our loan origination volumes may increase or decrease these percentages in the future. Our servicing portfolio also grew another 4% during the quarter to $17.8 billion at September 30, with a weighted average servicing fee of approximately 46 basis points and an estimated remaining life of approximately nine years. This portfolio will continue to generate a significant predictable annuity of income going forward of around $82 million gross annually. Additionally, early runoff in our servicing book continues to produce prepayment fees related to certain loans that have yield maintenance provisions. This accounted for $7.5 million of prepayment fees in the third quarter, which was up from $4.9 million in the second quarter. These fees are reported in servicing revenue, net of a write-off for the corresponding MSRs on these loans. We also continue to increase our interest-earning deposits with over $500 million of escrow balances from our agency servicing business, which are earning slightly less than one-month LIBOR. These balances provide a natural hedge against rising interest rates, as they will generate significant additional earnings power as rates continue to rise. In fact, every 1% increase in interest rates, these deposits could earn an additional $0.05 a share an additional earnings annually. In our balance sheet lending operation, we have grown our portfolio 20% to $3.2 billion on $1.2 billion in originations thus far in 2018. This significant growth continues to increase our core earnings run rate, and based on our current pipeline and deep origination network, we remain extremely confident in our ability to continue to grow our balance sheet investment portfolio in the future. Our $3.2 billion investment portfolio had an all-in yield of approximately 7.52% at September 30, which is up from a yield of approximately 7.40% at June 30, mainly due to an increase in LIBOR. The average balance in our core investments increased to $3.3 billion for the third quarter from $2.9 billion for the second quarter, due to the significant growth we experienced in the second quarter and from the timing of our originations and runoff in the third quarter. And the average yield on these investments is approximately 7.40% for both the second and third quarters. Total debt on our core assets was approximately $2.9 billion at September 30, with an all-in debt cost of approximately 5.03%, compared to a debt cost of around 4.93% at June 30, mainly due to an increase in LIBOR. The average balance on our debt facilities increased to approximately $2.9 billion for the third quarter from approximately $2.5 billion for the second quarter, primarily due to financing our second and third quarter originations, and the average cost of funds in our debt facility decreased to approximately 4.93% for the third quarter, compared to 5.01% for the second quarter, excluding $2.9 million of non-cash fees we expensed related to the early payoff of debt in the second quarter, despite an increase in LIBOR during the quarter. This was mainly due to the significant reduction in interest costs we have experienced from improved terms in our warehouse lines, our new CLO execution and the replacement of our higher-cost unsecured debt with new lower-cost unsecured debt. Overall, net interest spreads in our core assets on a GAAP basis increased to 2.44% this quarter, compared to 2.39% last quarter, excluding certain non-cash fees expense from early payoff of debt, mainly due to reduced debt cost in the third quarter. Our overall spot interest spread was also up to 2.49% at September 30 from 2.47% at June 30. And with approximately 88% of our portfolio comprised of floating rate loans, we will see an increase in net interest income spread, as interest rates continue to rise in the future. Additionally, as Ivan mentioned earlier, we believe the execution of our new convertible debt issued in July at lower rates will increase our annual AFO – AFFO by $0.02 to $0.03 a share. And lastly, the average leverage ratio on our core lending assets, including the trust preferreds and perpetual preferred stock as equity was relatively flat at 79% in the third quarter versus 78% in the second quarter, and our overall debt-to-equity ratio on a spot basis, including the trust preferreds and preferred stock as equity was flat at 2.5:1 at both September 30 and June 30. That completes our prepared remarks for this morning. I’ll now turn it back to the operator to take any questions you may have at this time. Norma?