Metropolitan Bank Holding Corp. (NYSE:MCB) Q1 2022 Earnings Conference Call April 22, 2022 9:00 AM ET
Company Participants
Mark DeFazio - President and CEO
Greg Sigrist - Executive Vice President and CFO
Conference Call Participants
Chris O’Connell - KBW
Alex Lau - JP Morgan
Operator
Welcome to Metropolitan Commercial Bank First Quarter 2022 Earnings Call. Hosting the call today from Metropolitan Commercial Bank are Mark DeFazio, President and Chief Executive Officer; and Mark (sic) [Greg] Sigrist, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer.
Today’s call is being recorded. At this time, all participants have been placed in a listen-only mode and the floor will be open for your questions following the prepared remarks. [Operator Instructions]
During today’s presentation, reference will be made to the company’s earnings release and investor presentation, copies of which are available at MCBankNY.com.
Today’s presentation may include forward-looking statements that are subject to certain risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to differ materially. Please refer to the company’s notices regarding forward-looking statements and non-GAAP measures that appear in the earnings release.
It is now my pleasure to turn the floor over to Mark DeFazio, President and Chief Executive Officer. You may begin.
Mark DeFazio
Thank you, Brittany. Good morning all and welcome to MCB’s first quarter earnings call. Greg and I will go through some brief information and then hopefully get into a robust Q&A. Notwithstanding that MCB entered 2022 on a solid footing and thinking that we were closing in on the final chapter of COVID. We were abruptly faced with an Omicron variant, geopolitical risk due to the war breaking out of Ukraine, fed tightening and on track with the highest inflationary numbers we’ve seen in years. Who those unprepared for these challenges, this could be fatal.
After two decades of operations, the one thing that stands out in my mind is the consistent readiness of MCB has demonstrated in each disruptive event that have occurred over these years. MCBs resilience during these times continued to not only protect its balance sheet, but grow through it, continuing to drive profitability and shareholder value.
What I find most interesting in this quarter as we face the challenges, I noted earlier, is how strategic this quarter was for MCB and its clients, deploying excess liquidity. Our historical obsession, as I say, with the liability side of our balance sheet continues to pay dividends. The robust and scalable low cost deposit verticals embedded into our business model affords us the ability to manage our margin and to deploy excess liquidity into higher earning assets. Our business strategy is no different than our clients, whose business plan is to leverage their equity and liquidity to drive targeted returns for their shareholders.