Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the first quarter 2009 earnings presentation on the 23rd of April, 2009. Throughout today’s recorded presentation, all participants will be in a listen-only mode. After the presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. (Operator instructions) I would now like to hand the conference over to Dianne Grenz. Please go ahead madam.

Thank you, Halley. Good morning. I’d like to thank everyone for participating in Valley’s first quarter 2009 earnings conference call both by telephone and through our webcast. If you have not read the earnings release we issued early this morning, you may access it along with the financial tables and schedules from our Web site at valleynationalbank.com, and by click on the ‘Shareholder Relations’ link. And before we start, I’d like to mention that comments made during this call may contain forward-looking statements relating to the banking industry and to Valley National Bancorp. Valley encourages participants to refer to our SEC filings, including those found in Forms 8-K, 10-K, and 10-Q for a complete discussion of forward-looking statements. And now, I would like to turn the call over to the Valley’s Chairman, President, and CEO, Gerald Lipkin.

Thank you, Dianne, and good morning and welcome to our first quarter 2009 earnings conference call. During the quarter, Valley generated earnings of $37.4 million, an increase of over 120% from the prior quarter and over 18% from the same period one year ago. With these results, Valley continues to differentiate itself from many of its peers within the banking industry. Our proven track record of delivering consistent results in a multitude of operating environment is evidenced by our strong performance this quarter. The economic environment continues to be challenging for many within the banking industry. Years of relaxed credit underwriting combined with excessive emphasis on short-term results have in part established a difficult hurdle for many financial institutions and will take a significant amount of time to work through the system. Rising unemployment coupled with a stagnant economy created an added air of uncertainty surrounding the general economic growth of our marketplace. Thus far, Valley’s loan portfolio has performed in an exemplary manner and the bank has been able to consistently generate significant operating income. Nevertheless, management must continue to remain vigilant in loan underwriting and be careful not to ignore the potential impact that a prolonged recession may have on our local economy. Recklessly attempting to accelerate loan growth which exceeds that of our marketplace could lead to financial suicide. As an alternative to operate soundly in this environment and expand net income and shareholder value, Valley has laid our four core operating focuses. Number one, attempt to gain market share by taking strong credits from banks weakened by the economy. Two, remain steadfast in our conservative approach to underwriting. Three, implement actions to reduce operating expenses. And four, reevaluate pricing on all loan and deposit relationships. Building the most profitable organization, not the largest, is Valley's operating…

Thank you, Gerry. My comments this morning in the press release from (inaudible) today reflect the 5% stock dividend declared on April 14, 2009, and to be issued May 22, 2009. As a result, all per share data has been adjusted. During the quarter, Valley early adopted the new fair value and other-than-temporary impairment guidance. As a result, the new calculation and subsequent disclosure of OTTI on the financial statements is different from that of prior periods. In calculating OTTI, both the amount attributable to potential credit losses and the amount attributable to changes in interest rates and other market fluctuations are presented on the income statement. However, now only the credit portion of OTTI impacts earnings. In addition, the new guidance requires Valley to judiciously review all broker prices received on its securities portfolio and determine whether an active and liquid market exists for each. Should management identify in there liquid in this stress market, the valuation of each security must be calculated in accordance with a level three valuation approach as identified in FAS 157. In addition, as a result of Valley's early adoption of this FSP, Valley's equity section of the balance sheet recognized a cumulative accounting adjustment and the OCI section of the balance sheet was positively impacted. The first quarter results include a couple of non-core items, which I will discuss. First, there were OTTI charges recorded in non-interest income during the quarter, totaling $2.2 million, net of the portion of loss recognized in OCI. Three private label mortgage-backed securities classified as available for sale comprised the lot. As of March 31, 2009, the adjusted book value for the three securities was $36.5 million and the market value was $32.8 million. All three securities are currently performing and meeting all contractual obligations. Under current industry…

(Operator instructions) The first question comes from Matthew Clark from KBW. Please go ahead with your question. Matthew Clark – KBW: Sure, thanks. Good morning, guys. Can you first just touch on the incremental increase in non-performers – I guess may be in the NPL bucket relative to what you guys had in the 30-90 plus bucket at year end. It seems like the pull through there was fairly limited. I am just curious as to what might be going on in that delinquency bucket. Are things kind of remaining in there, have you seen some turnover, when things were nearly in or being put back on accruals, just curious about the ins and outs.

Nothing first of all has been put back on accrual, I don't think so. That is not really an issue at all. I think our delinquencies remain at levels that they are and we are not seeing any major increase moving through to the non-accrual level. We saw our fuel loans come through. As you saw, we went up $14 million during the quarter.

We also see some go out. They are not stagnant, sitting in there, we have a lot of them that pay off. Matthew Clark – KBW: Yes, that was my question, okay. And then another question along the lines of the commercial real estate bucket and just reserving methodology. Obviously, delinquencies there remain very low and manageable and you guys have obviously stress tested the book. But just curious, the reserves there were down one basis point, year over year they were down it more than that, I will say 10 basis points. Obviously concerns about rising vacancies in the New York/New Jersey area are a growing concern. Just curious about the reserving methodology there and why that might not – and whether or not that might start to turn back up.

Yes, Matt, the reason it really went down is because we had been originating some loans in new territories, Brooklyn and Queens, and we had made sure we reserved additional amounts for that; as those loans begin to mature and they have matured by probably about two years now and we are very comfortable with what we're seeing with those loans in terms of their performance. We need less of a reserve against something that we had provided extra for. So that is the only reason you see any kind of decline, it is not for any other purpose. Matthew Clark – KBW: Okay.

The quality, to answer the other half of your question, that we have seen has held up very strong. Matthew Clark – KBW: All right. Okay, and should – I guess could an area of concern be – later in the year, maybe along the lines of the smaller retail strips, for example, where you don't have a main anchor like a grocery store, but where you might have four or five units in a strip, where one goes vacant or even a big box next door goes vacant and it causes others to struggle. You know, one going vacant in a four or five tenant strip obviously would result in a 20% or even 25% vacancy. I am just curious about – if that is a larger area of concern for you all maybe later in the year.

Well, number one, we don't have as many of that type of situation on our books. We have some, obviously, but not any great concentration in that area. Number one. Number two, as I mentioned in some of our stress testing, we have on that type of a facility, almost universally strong guarantors – with the guarantors, we have diversified cash flows, external to the small strip. So we have not yet seen any real deterioration in that portfolio at all.

That was Bob Meyer, Head of our Commercial Lending area, who just spoke, for the benefit of those on the phone. We are comfortable with what we have seen so far. Matthew Clark – KBW: You haven't seen any of those types of situations though where you have been able to work out of those.

None of our non-performing loans are in that bucket. (inaudible).

I think one of the other points, Matt – that in many of our shopping centers, we have in large amount, where there are anchors, a lot of them are supermarkets, which are very strong and we are comfortable that those will be able to hold up some of the shopping centers. I admit there was some decline in tenants beyond that.

One of the hallmarks to Valley's success over the years has been in our underwriting. Our underwriting criteria is tough and we try to make sure that in all circumstances, the bank is protected. So, when times get difficult, it is not a guarantee that you are not going to suffer problems, but the probability of problems is diminished significantly. Matthew Clark – KBW: That is helpful. Thank you.

(Operator instructions) Thank you. Our next question comes from Travis Anderson from Gilder, Gagnon, Howe. Please go ahead with your question. Travis Anderson – Gilder, Gagnon, Howe: Good morning. How are you? I was wondering, now that we are six months or so into this crash in New York, whether you are seeing any of that spill over at all into the residential real estate, if you have seen any change. I remember you telling us that last year real estate in northern New Jersey was only down by 10% in price. Wonder if you have seen any change lately?

We have not seen, Al Engel is sitting next to me, and is our (inaudible) – Al?

Yes, our past dues 30 days and up have held relatively constant. One of the things that we have always done is a lot of the Wall Street employment tends toward the higher-priced real estate. We have always required significant equity in the higher-priced real estate and equity is protecting us in this real estate recession. While many of the Wall Street crowd when they did lose employment left with benefit packages that they are presently living on. The real stress in that marketplace may still come later this year. But thus far, we are not seeing any significant sign to stress in that portfolio. Travis Anderson – Gilder, Gagnon, Howe: Thanks.

Thank you, sir. The next question comes from Tong Katin [ph] from Dakhnan Securities [ph]. Please go ahead with your question. Tong Katin – Dakhnan Securities: Hi, good morning. Thank you for taking the question. Two things, I probably just missed them. Did you give a commercial real estate mortgage bucket delinquency number? And if not, what is it? And secondly –

Roughly, 1.25% Tong Katin – Dakhnan Securities: What was the number?

1.25%. Tong Katin – Dakhnan Securities: 1.25%. And the other question was –

That’s 30 days delinquent. Not 90 or non-accrual, that’s everything in the bucket. Tong Katin – Dakhnan Securities: I understand. Thank you. The other thing that I missed it, when you talked about the stress test in the commercial mortgage side, you mentioned the number six out of X number of mortgages have loan-to-value greater than 90%. What was the total?

It was 2,000. I think it came out as 200. It was actually – there were 2,000 loans. Tong Katin – Dakhnan Securities: Right. So you said, if a 20% decline in value would take that number up to 10%. So that’s why I worried my math wasn’t working –

All right. Tong Katin – Dakhnan Securities: Okay. Thank you very much for the clarification.

All right.

Thank you, sir. (Operator instructions) Thank you. There appear to be no further questions. Please continue with any other points you wish to raise.

Well, we just want to thank everybody for listening in. And hope to be speaking to you in three months.