Greetings, and welcome to the Tiptree Fourth Quarter and Full Year 2018 Earnings Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to your host, Sandra Bell, Chief Financial Officer. Thank you. You may begin.

Good morning, and welcome to our fourth quarter 2018 earnings call. We are joined today by our Executive Chairman, Michael Barnes; and our CEO, Jonathan Ilany. We have posted the earnings release and presentation on our website at tiptreeinc.com. Our remarks today are qualified in their entirety by the disclaimers on Page 1 of the presentation. This presentation supplements our SEC filings and is provided solely for information purposes. Throughout the presentation, we make forward-looking statements. Our businesses are subject to risks and uncertainties, which are outlined in our SEC filings and which could impact our expectations of future results. Except as required by securities law, we undertake no obligation to update any forward-looking statements. In addition, we use non-GAAP measures, which we believe provide supplemental information about our businesses and are useful to investors. As these measures are not GAAP, they should not be used as a substitute for GAAP disclosures. The Appendix in the presentation provides a reconciliation of each of these measures to their GAAP equivalent. With that, we will turn the call over to Michael.

Thank you, Sandra. Good morning, everyone. I’ll begin the call today by going through our 2018 accomplishments relative to our original goals for the year. We started 2018 with three key objectives, grow the insurance business organically and through acquisition while maintaining our focus on strong underwriting performance; grow and refine the investments within Tiptree Capital; and generate enhanced risk adjusted long-term returns for our shareholders. Beginning with the first of these objectives, our specialty insurance business grew significantly in 2018. Gross written premiums were up 13% while our net written premiums were up 11.7% both driven by organic growth and credit protection and other specialty product line. Strong consumer demand for credit and warranties on products ranging from autos to furniture continued to support our growth. Our combined ratio remains steady in the low 90s demonstrating our continued ability to underwrite profitably while increasing written premium. Both factors contributed to strong growth in operating EBITDA in our insurance business which was up 21% over the prior year. As we move into 2019, we believe our expansion in the Europe will support additional organic growth throughout the year and complement our U.S. business. Although we made no acquisition in 2018, we continue to look for the right platforms at the right price. We use a disciplined approach to evaluating potential acquisition focusing on opportunities that build on our current offering or add adjacent products that complement our strength. Our second objective was to grow and refine the investments within Tiptree Capital. As we mentioned in the first quarter, the sale of our senior’s housing business to Invesque was the first of those tests and was completed in February of 2018. In the fourth quarter, our gain increased as Invesque sold certain properties previously owned by us resulting in a total…

Thank you, Michael. On Page 4, we highlight the Company's key metrics for 2018. Net income was $29.9 million, an increase of $24.7 million from the prior year period. Pretax income including continuing and discontinued operations was $37.7 million, also up significantly from 2017. The increase in both metrics was primarily driven by improvement in income at our insurance business and the gain on sale of our senior living business. Partially offsetting those factors was $34.8 million of pretax unrealized losses on investments, $20.7 million was related to mark-to-market declines on our Invesque shares, and $6.9 million on our corporate loan portfolio. Operating EBITDA for the year was $54.9 million, down just under 10%. The year was positively impacted by growth in our insurance operations. But that positive performance was more than offset by lower distribution as a result of the prior sale of credit related investments, combined with the fact that capital was not yet fully redeployed into late 2018. On the bottom of the Page, we show a walk from operating EBITDA to total pretax income, highlighting the key differences between the two metrics. Book value per share increased to $10.79, up $0.82 from the prior year end, as the gain on the sale of our seniors housing business, improvement in insurance results, and share buybacks overcame any negative factors. Turning to Page 5, we highlight our capital allocated between specialty insurance and Tiptree capital along with the respective returns on that capital, in order to assist investors in understanding Tiptree value. When considering capital allocation decisions, we look at total capital which includes corporate debt held at the holding company and at our insurance subsidiary. We evaluate our return on capital using trailing 12 months operating EBITDA, which for the most recent period was $54.9 million. Our…

Thanks Sandra. Throughout 2018, we executed on several strategic objectives to expand our insurance business, to realign our investments in Tiptree Capital, and to simplify our corporate structure. Our total return as measured by growth of book value and dividends paid was 9.6% despite the headwinds from mark to market on our Invesque shares and credit risk. In 2019, we expect to see continued growth in our insurance business both organically and selectively through acquisition, should we find the right one. We will also look to grow our insurance investment portfolio in line with the business and to enhance the total return over the long term. Within Tiptree capital, we expect to continue to realign our capital where we believe the most attractive long-term opportunities exists, including the continued repositioning of our asset management business and investing in the shipping sector, which we believe is an attractive point in the cycle. With that, we will open the line for questions.

Thank you, Matt, and thanks everyone for joining us today. If you have any questions, please feel free to reach out to me directly. This concludes our fourth quarter conference call.

This concludes today's teleconference. You may disconnect your lines at this time. Thank you again for your participation.