Dime Community reports Q1 EPS 41c, consensus 37c

Capital ratios continue to build, with the Company’s Tier 1 Risk Based Capital Ratio increasing to 11.11% and the Common Equity Tier 1 Ratio increasing to 10.00% at March 31, 2024. Book value per common share was $28.84 at March 31, 2024 compared to $28.58 at December 31, 2023. Stuart Lubow, President and CEO stated, “Dime began 2024 by executing on our growth plan, which prioritizes core deposit growth and diversifying our balance sheet. On a year-to-date basis, we have recruited 34 talented revenue-producing bankers, across our Private and Commercial Bank and C&I lending operations, spread across 8 different Groups. We expect these bankers to contribute meaningfully to our growth in the years ahead. Looking back, our recruiting efforts last year are beginning to pay dividends, with the deposit-gathering Groups hired in 2023 approaching $600 million in deposits; these achievements helped drive the 19% annualized growth in core deposits in the first quarter of 2024. The significant momentum on the deposit front allowed us to reduce our FHLB borrowing position by 41% versus year-end levels. Our results were characterized by stable asset quality, increasing capital ratios, a reduction in our wholesale funding, and prudent expense management. Importantly, the Net Interest Margin for the month of March was 2.23%, which was above the reported first quarter Net Interest Margin of 2.21%. This portends well for the quarters ahead in terms of the NIM trajectory. We continue to build our loan pipeline prudently and recently closed our first loan in our new Healthcare vertical; this new vertical provides us an important avenue to diversify our balance sheet over time. The reduction in our loan-to-deposit ratio to 98.8%, driven by strong deposit growth, provides us even more flexibility to take advantage of the current lending opportunities in the marketplace.”