OceanFirst Financial Corp. (NASDAQ:OCFC) Q4 2023 Earnings Conference Call January 19, 2024 11:00 AM ET

Company Participants

Alfred Goon - Senior Vice President, Corporate Development and Investor Relations

Christopher Maher - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Joseph Lebel - President and Chief Operating Officer

Patrick Barrett - Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer

Conference Call Participants

Daniel Tamayo - Raymond James

Frank Schiraldi - Piper Sandler

Michael Perito - KBW

David Bishop - Hovde Group

Matthew Breese - Stephens, Inc.

Manuel Navas - D.A. Davidson

Christopher Marinac - Janney Montgomery Scott

Operator

Hello, everyone, and welcome to the OceanFirst Financial Corp Q4 '23 Earnings Release and thank you for standing by. My name is Daisy, and I'll be coordinating your call today. [Operator Instructions]

Now I would like to hand over to your host, Alfred Goon from OceanFirst to begin. Alfred, please go ahead.

Alfred Goon

Thank you, Daisy. Good morning, and welcome to the OceanFirst Fourth Quarter 2023 Earnings Call. I am Alfred Goon, SVP of Corporate Development and Investor Relations. Before we kick off the call, we'd like to remind everyone that our quarterly earnings release and related earnings supplement can be found on the company website oceanfirst.com.

Our remarks today may contain forward-looking statements and may refer to non-GAAP financial measures. All participants should refer to our SEC filings, including those found in our Forms 8-K, 10-Q and 10-K for a complete discussion of forward-looking statements and any factors that could cause actual results to differ from those statements.

Thank you and I will now turn the call over to Christopher Maher, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer.

Christopher Maher

Thank you, Alfred. Good morning and thank you to all been able to join our fourth quarter 2023 earnings conference call. This morning, I'm joined by our President, Joe Lebel; and our Chief Financial Officer, Pat Barrett.

We appreciate your interest in our performance and this opportunity to discuss our results with you. This morning, we'll provide brief remarks about the financial and operating performance for the quarter and some color regarding the outlook for our business. We may refer to the slides filed in connection with the earnings release throughout the call. After our discussion, we look forward to taking your questions.

Our financial results for the fourth quarter included GAAP diluted earnings per share of $0.46. Our earnings reflect net interest income of $87.8 million representing a modest decrease compared to the prior linked quarter of $91 million. Operating expenses decreased to $60.2 million, excluding the FDIC special assessment of $1.7 million. Operating expenses decreased to $58.5 million.