Welcome to Flushing Financial Corporation's 2017 Fourth Quarter Earnings Conference Call. Hosting the call today are John Buran, President and Chief Executive Officer, and Susan Cullen, Senior Executive Vice President, Treasurer and Chief Financial Officer. Today's call is being recorded. [Operator Instructions] A copy of the fourth quarter earnings release and slide presentation that the company will be referencing today are available on its Investor Relations website at www.flushingbank.com. Before beginning, the Company would like to remind you that discussions during this call contains forward-looking statements made under the Safe Harbor provisions of the US Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such statements are subject to risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause actual results to differ materially from those contained in such statements. Such factors are included in our filings with the US Securities and Exchange Commission. Flushing Financial Corporation does not undertake any obligation to update any forward-looking statements except as required under applicable law. During this call, references to several non-GAAP financial measures, as supplemental measures to review and assess operating performance, will be made. These non-GAAP financial measures are not intended to be considered in isolation or as a substitute for the financial information prepared and presented in accordance with US GAAP. For any information about these non-GAAP measures and reconciliation to GAAP measures, please refer to the earnings release. I'd now like to introduce John Buran, President and Chief Executive Officer, who will provide an overview of the strategy and results.

Thank you. Good morning. And welcome to our fourth quarter earnings call. As part of our continuing effort to increase financial transparency and investor engagement, we hope to provide you with additional insight into our business strategy, earnings power, and sustainable competitive advantages. Our vision as a company remains the same and that is to be the preeminent community bank in a multicultural market. We create value and attract new customers by delivering a superior and consistent experience through quality service and personalized attention as we continue to execute and deliver profitable growth. Today, I'll start with our fourth quarter and 2017 highlights, followed by a brief overview of the strategies that we're successfully executing to create long-term shareholder value. Then, Susan Cullen, our CFO, will review our financial performance in greater detail. Susan and I will address your questions at the end of our prepared remarks as time permits. We recognized record net interest income for the year as a result of executing our strategic initiative of focusing on loan yield as opposed to volume. Additionally, during the quarter, we reduced future credit risk, reduced future interest rate risk and improved the scalability of branch network expenses. Starting on Page 3, as announced in yesterday’s press release, fourth quarter 2017 GAAP diluted EPS was $0.21 and core diluted EPS was $0.33. Due to the U.S. Federal tax reform, we recognized a charge of $3.8 million or $0.13 a share related to the revaluation of our net deferred tax assets. During the fourth quarter, we also recorded a provision for loan losses of $6.6 million reducing EPS by $0.13 after-tax as we reduced our taxi medallion portfolio by over 50% to a remaining conservative book value of $6.8 million and placed all taxi medallion loans on non-accrual status. After observing…

Thank you, John. I’ll start on Slide 7. Total loans were $5.2 billion, up 2% quarter-over-quarter and up 7% from December 31, 2016 as we continue to focus on the origination of multifamily commercial real estate and commercial business loans with full-banking relationships. We continue to diversify our loan portfolio as C&I originations for the quarter were 37% of total originations versus the existing portfolio totaling of 14% of gross loans. At December 31, our loan pipeline was strong and totaled $360 million, which is down from the last quarter, but up from a year ago. The interest rate on the real estate loans in the pipeline increased to 4.10% from an average rate of 4.04% for the linked quarter. The loan-to-value ratio on our real estate portfolio at quarter-end remains a modest 39%. On slide 8, deposits increased 4% year-over-year but declined 1% quarter-over-quarter. As John noted, government deposits did not replenish as quickly as we expected during the fourth quarter resulting in an increase in loans-to-deposit ratio. However, through January 25, 2018, we’ve already seen government deposits increase $327 million. Year-over-year growth in the deposit base is primarily driven by money market non-interest bearing and savings accounts. We continued to increase core deposits, as represented by the year-over-year growth, with an emphasis on non-interest-bearing deposits, which increased 16% year-over-year. Non-interest-bearing deposits of $385 million represent 9% of total deposits. Our internal initiative of using business development officers to gather deposits from loan customers has been successful as business deposits exceed $700 million at December 31, 2017. Funding is also gathered through the iGObanking.com channel. At December 31, its deposits totaled $339 million, while the BankPurely balances were over $60 million. We are beginning to see rate pressure with increased competition for deposits, the average cost of funds has…

Thank you, Susan. Wrapping up, Slide 16 provides a summary of why we believe we remain well-positioned for continued strategic and profitable growth. To reiterate, our vision is to be the preeminent community financial services company in our multicultural market by exceeding customer expectations and leveraging our strong banking relationships. The New York City market continues to represent a significant opportunity for us. We remain focused on providing a superior and consistent experience at every touch point for our customers and maximizing shareholder value. Those of you who have held our stock for over the last five years know our total shareholder return has been 108%. In conclusion, we have a strong foundation a proven track record, a clear strategy and a seasoned leadership team with a commitment to drive continued profitable growth. We will now take questions as time permits. Operator, I'll turn it over to you.

[Operator Instructions] The first question comes from Collyn Gilbert with KBW. Please go ahead.

Thanks, good morning everyone.

Good morning.

Good morning.

I apologize, I know you guys covered a lot in the slides and unfortunately I didn’t have the slides for the call. So, if I am repeating things that you’ve already kind of laid out in there, I apologize. But, if I could just kind of start with the NIM, and I know you had indicated that you expect continued compression. But likely offset to hopefully increase the NII. Can you just talk about kind of moving the dynamics that are going on there and I am assuming obviously the loan mix is also what’s impacting the loan yield declines. But just sort of your outlook for the NIM and then as well as outlook for loan growth?

Right. So we did have a quarter-over-quarter decline in the – in new loans coming on board in terms of yield. But over the course of the year, we were up about 34 basis points. So, I think that that trend will be the type of trend that we will continue to see as lower yielding loans roll off. It looks like we may actually start to see a little bit more benefit because the yield curve seems to be sloping upward a little bit. So you have that dynamic working which is a natural 20% or so of the loan portfolio rolling off. Some of which is contractually set up to move up in rates to begin with. Secondly, we have a number of loans that are backed up by swaps and that’s somewhere around…

280

$280 million and in addition, we have this $400 million of liability hedges that we just recently put in place, forward-looking hedges. So, those are the dynamics that are tending to work in our favor. Obviously, the one that’s not working in our favor is the continued increase in the short-end of the curve by the Federal Reserve actions. But, I do certainly see the loan portfolio starting to give us positive news and it has the last couple of quarters as new loans have come on at a better yield than the portfolio and I expect that that trend will continue into the year, particularly as we put on a little bit more in the C&I world.

Okay, okay. That’s helpful. And just, specifically to the $400 million of swaps that you added, what – do you anticipate that impact to be on the NIM for those – for the funding cost for those?

So, obviously, that’s going to depend upon the movement in rates. We already know that they are – there are already in the money providing as a positive impact on NIM. I can’t recall what the dollar amount is. It’s small at this point in time.

Because we entered into them in the middle to latter part of December, but they are in the money as John said, and given the size and we expect to have some meaningful impact on our NIM going forward.

So, if you think in terms of – let’s say interest protection that we have, we may have about $700 million, roughly three on the asset side of the balance sheet and $400 million on the liability side of the balance sheet that we think will help us stable some of the NIM pressure that we had experienced.

Okay, okay. And then, outlook for loan growth and maybe what the mix of loans you are kind of expecting as the year progresses?

I think we’ve – similar to our guidance last year; we talked about a high-single-digits to low double-digits. We clearly came in on high-single-digits this year. I think some of that is going to depend upon where we fall in the range is going to be dependent somewhat upon the activity in the multifamily market. We do know that that one competitor appears to be pulling back a little bit on that market, possibly another competitor will be jumping in. So, a little bit unknown in that category. But we do have – we do have a robust pipeline in our commercial space or business banking space, non-commercial real estate business banking space.

Okay, okay. That’s helpful. And then just the impact of the government deposits rolling out in the fourth quarter, you said you had to utilize borrowings and then now they are coming back on, just curious of the cost differential between those, roughly $327 million or so of what you had to pay on the government deposits versus borrowings?

Somewhere around 50 basis points.

Okay, so you got a 50 basis point pick-up when they – on the deposits versus the borrowings?

Correct.

Okay, okay.

Correct.

All right. That’s helpful. And then, just on the reserves, so obviously, resolution of taxi this quarter, how should I presume that the drop in the allowances, because you had a specific reserve tied to the taxi, but how should we think about kind of the reserve levels trending from here?

The reserve levels should trend upwards as our growth goes. So, as I said in the remarks, the allowance should be commensurate what the growth in the loan portfolio. We don’t anticipate change in our methodology anytime soon until we have undersea some. So we would expect it to remain relatively constant but growing for the loan portfolio growth.

Got it. Okay, that’s helpful. All right. I’ll leave it there. Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you, Collyn.

The next question comes from Steven Comery with Gabelli. Please go ahead.

Hey, thanks for taking my question. I was just wondering and kind of Collyn touched on this, but – so the decline in the origination yields of 10 basis points, was that due to mix shift? I know you guys brought on more multifamily in the fourth quarter versus the third quarter or was pricing actually coming down across the board?

No, I think there was a little bit of a mix shift there. But the multifamily market has been kind of up and down over the course of the yield and in the year. And in this particular quarter, we just had a little bit more multifamily than we had commercial real estate or C&I. So, I think you will see some differential swinging back and forth as we look for opportunities to either grow or where more opportunities to pickup yield. But, I think the important thing to recognize is there is an overall trend that’s taking place as a result of the repricing of the multifamily and the commercial real estate portfolio. The contractual repricing of those loans going forward to the tune of 20% of the portfolio, 20% to – between 20% and 25% of the portfolio changing over the course of any given year. So, we think that there is a baseline trend that is going to be net positive for the loan yields and that will be either greater or lesser in any given quarter based upon the mix. That’s probably the best way of putting it.

Okay. Thanks, that’s helpful. And then, just on the C&I growth, I mean, you guys had a pretty good quarter there and the quarter, really good quarter, and the fourth quarter as far as growing that. Are conditions improving there? Are you guys getting better approaching borrowers? Or what’s going on there?

I just think it’s a natural result of our continued focus in this area, and we are always on the outlook for new lenders. So, as those new lenders come on board, it sometimes takes them a little while to get, let’s say seasoned, to get their customers moved over. So, there is this progression that takes place and I think you’ve seen that in the last couple of quarters or so. And we are very pleased with the state of that pipeline at this point in time as well. So we are in very good shape for continued growth in C&I.

Okay, very good. And then, one more for me. On the conversion in the Universal Banker branches, you guys mentioned a 20% savings in comp cost, can you give us an idea of kind of what the dollar amount of that is, as far as what the total comp costs are or maybe what that 20% is? If you have some idea of that magnitude?

So, let’s say the typical branch might have

Six, eight.

Eight FTE, let’s say, typical branch might have eight FTE. We might drop two of those FTE. The average salaries there might be around $50,000, $55,000 plus fringe. So, I can’t do that math in my head. But, it’s basically those two FTE and then whatever we can garner in terms of on top of that whatever we can garner in terms of smaller footprint has a positive impact as we reconfigure the real estate as well.

Okay. So, well it sounds like a good starting point anyway. Okay, thanks guys.

[Operator Instructions] The next question comes from Brody Preston with Piper Jaffray. Please go ahead.

Good morning guys. How are you?

Good morning.

Good morning.

I just – let’s start with the swaps. I just wanted to get an idea as to – those must have been floating to fixed and so I just wanted to get an idea as to what the rate is that you are paying on those?

You are right. They are floating to fix. They are LIBOR based. So they move. We estimate the cost on to be about $0.02 per share going forward.

You estimate what?

About $0.02 per share.

Of pickups?

Well, we put them on with the interest rates being where they were at the time, the estimated cost will be $0.02. However, rates move since we’ve put those on and as John mentioned, we’ve seen a little bit of a pickup on those.

Okay, okay. I got you, I got you. Yes, thank you. And then, just sort of touching on the core mortgage loan yields, so for your ex prepay on those, I have those declining by about eight basis points. I just wanted to get a sense for – I guess what, what current multifamily loan yields are and sort of your feeling on the multifamily market, if you are seeing any pickup in transaction volumes at all?

I think transaction volumes have been relatively stable. The yields on that portfolio vary on what’s going on in the market. So, at the – for the largest products, we are probably getting about 3.75 or so. That’s what the market is for smaller multifamily, it can be into the fours.

Okay, that’s okay.

So, we have two efforts. We have two efforts on – in that area. So, one is directly focused against larger multifamily and then we have a separate group of sales people that focus on the smaller multifamily. So, even within the multifamily, there is a risk – a mix dynamic. Those numbers by the way are four or five year resets.

Yes, yes, okay. Got it. And then, you mentioned earlier in your prepared remarks about the 20% of – I guess, the CRE/multifamily portfolio rolling off and being replaced at potentially higher yields. I just wanted to get a sense for what the yield differential was between, you said 3.75 to 4 for multifamily on average. So I guess what the yield pickup there from a 20% roll offs?

So, contractually, they reprice – they are contractually scheduled to reprice 200 basis points over the Federal Home Loan Bank maturity - Federal Home Loan Bank borrowing maturity. So, what generally occurs, is that, the customer makes a decision at that point in time, whether they want to go through the additional expense to move to another lender or do they want to pay an additional 200 basis points over the Federal Home Loan Bank level, which is part of the contractually oriented. So, five-year FHLB rates right now are 285. So, we are talking about 485 contractually, sometimes there is a little bit of negotiation going on. So, we may not get the 485, but the borrowers generally come back to us.

Okay, are they allowed to prepay and refi with you guys?

Yes, they are. Usually, that also requires at least on our part some additional above market rate. There is clearly we have leverage at that point in time.

Okay, that’s good color. And, I guess, going back to the loan growth guide of high-single to low-double-digits, with the loan-to-deposit ratio at 118%, I know you said you had some inflows from government deposits. I guess, is that becoming a constraining factor on growth at all? Or are you expecting that to trend down given the government deposit inflows in the first quarter so far?

I am sorry. Just, could you repeat the question?

Yes, I guess, it was a bit of a two-parter, I guess. One, is the loan-to-deposit ratio given where it is now at 118% a constraining factor on growth moving forward at all? And do you expect that number to trend down given the inflows that you’ve seen from government deposits so far in the first quarter?

So, we do not see – let’s say, it’s a constraint on our growth. As a matter of fact, I think it in some case, our ability and our willingness to go out into the wholesale markets has enabled us to ladder out our liabilities to some degree. So, we will kind of look at it as an advantage to – and we are not concerned about the loan-to-deposit ratio being at this level. That said, we think that the influx of additional government deposits should help to bring that level down.

Okay. And then, one last question for me. I know you said that you are going to continue with the conversion to Universal Banker that now looks like just based on the question earlier, saves you about a little over $100,000 in compensation costs just given the FTE cuts that you outlined. So I guess, just for the outlook for expenses moving forward, did I hear you say that you expect it to be flat moving forward into 2018?

Year-over-year, yes, it will be flat. But remember, we have the seasonality, which will give us an increase in G&A expenses in the first quarter.

But for overall, for the year?

Overall, it will be relatively flat.

Okay, great. Thank you very much guys.

Great, thank you.

Thank you.

Showing no more questions in the queue, this will conclude our question-and-answer session. I would like to turn the conference back to John Buran for any closing remarks.

Well, we want to thank everybody for joining us today on our fourth quarter 2017 earnings call. And we appreciate your support of Flushing Financial Corporation. We look forward to talking with you next quarter and thank you again for your attention and your questions.

Thank you.

The conference is now concluded. Thank you for attending today’s presentation. You may now disconnect.