Good day, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Dime Commercial Bancshares, Inc. Third Quarter Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are on a listen-only mode. As of the speaker's presentation, there will be a question and answer session. To ask a question during the session, you will need to press star 11 on your telephone. You will then hear an automated message advising your hand is raised. To withdraw your question, please press star 11 again. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. Before we begin, the company would like to remind you that discussions during this call contain forward-looking statements made under the safe harbor provisions of the U.S. Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such statements are subject to risk, uncertainties, and other factors that may cause actual results to differ materially from those contained in any such statements, including as set forth in today's press release and the company's filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, to which we refer you. During this call, references will be made to non-GAAP financial measures as supplemental measures to review and assess operating performance. These non-GAAP financial measures are not intended to be considered in isolation or as a substitute for financial information prepared and presented in accordance with the U.S. GAAP. For information about these non-GAAP measures and for reconciliation to GAAP, please refer to today's earnings release. I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, Stuart Lubow, President and CEO. Please go ahead.

Good morning. Thank you, Shannon, and thank you all for joining us this morning for our third quarter earnings call. With me today are Avi Reddy, our Chief Operating Officer and CFO, and Tom Geisel, our Chief Commercial Officer. In my prepared remarks, I will touch upon the progress we made in the third quarter. In addition, I will provide a summary of our acquisition of Empire State Bank. Avi will then provide financial details for the third quarter and the financial impact of the Empire transactions. Suffice to say, Dimes' organic growth trajectory is very strong, and we have clearly differentiated our franchise from our local competitors as it relates to our ability to grow low-cost and best-in-class deposits, diversify our loan portfolio away from its historical CRE focus, attract talented bankers, and at the same time improve NIM and grow net interest income and overall profitability. Revenue news for the third quarter were $135 million, which once again was a record for dime. EPS was up 53% versus prior year. The NIM was up seven basis points versus the linked quarter as we were able to maintain our cost of deposits while improving our yield on loans. On the loan front, we are executing well and our growth plans are in place. Year over year, Growth in business loans was approximately $929 million, which represents 30% year-over-year increase. Our loan pipeline continues to be very strong and is approximately $1.4 billion, with a weighted average rate of approximately 6.5%. We were pleased to report a return of assets of 1.10% for the third quarter and a core efficiency ratio of below 48%. As you know, we have been very active on the hiring front over the past three years, and it's gratifying to see these investments contributing to improved profitability. We continue to believe that the hires we have made over the last few years have a long runway in front of them as we execute our clearly articulated growth plan. The disruption in our local marketplace remains very high, and the environment for our organic growth strategy as it relates to acquiring clients and bankers and many more. In this regard, we are pleased to announce our entry into the affordable housing space with the launch of a dedicated group that will be led by Mike Camoya. Finally, as it relates to profitability, our significant loan repricing opportunity over the next five quarters will continue to serve as a catalyst for continued revenue growth in the quarters ahead. During the quarter, we reduced our CRE ratio to to 338% while repurchasing approximately 1% of our shares outstanding. We continue to see significant long-term value in our shares underpinned by continued NIM expansion and interest income growth. Avi will provide some color on capital in his prepared remarks. This morning, we announced that we signed a definitive agreement to acquire Empire State Bank. We are very pleased to welcome CEO Phil Guarneri and his team to DIME. By way of background, Empire is a $600 million asset-sized commercial bank with a very granular, low-cost deposit base that is headquartered in Staten Island. DIMAS had our eye on having a greater ground-level branch presence in Staten Island for a long time, and we believe Empire is a very low-risk transaction for our shareholders, given their granular deposit base and low-risk LTV loan portfolio. The transaction expands DIMAS Presidents to all five boroughs of New York City and we believe Empire's granular deposit base will have real value in a higher rate environment. Empire represented a unique opportunity for DIME and a transaction economics and strategic rationale makes sense for both sets of shareholders. With that said, I will end by saying our focus remains on strong organic growth as seen by our 1.1 billion year-over-year growth in core deposits. Our significant cash position, which stood at over $2 billion at quarter end, positions us very favorably for organic growth, and we expect to benefit from meaningful loan repricing over the next five quarters. I want to end by thanking all our dedicated employees for their efforts and in positioning Dime as the best commercial bank in Metro New York. With that, I will turn the call over to Avi.

Thank you, Stu. Core EPS for the third quarter was $0.91 per share. Core pre-tax pre-provision net revenue of $70 million represented 186 basis points of average assets. By maintaining a strong focus on cost of funds management and the growth of our business loan portfolio, our NIM has now increased for 10 consecutive quarters. The reported third quarter NIM increased to $335. Excluding the benefits from purchase accounting and prepayment fees, The run rate NIM for the third quarter would have been closer to 332 compared to a 322 run rate for the prior quarter. Average earning assets for the third quarter was approximately $14.36 billion. Core cash operating expenses of approximately $64.3 million was in line with our expectations. The loan loss provision was in line with the prior quarter at $13.8 million, and the allowance to loans increased to 99 basis points. The loan loss provision in the quarter was primarily to cover specific reserves on CNI loans, growth in the business loan portfolio, and charge-offs on multifamily loans. While NPAs were up, substandard loans were down 7% on a linked quarter basis, and in addition, 30 to 89 days past due loans also declined on a linked quarter basis. As Stu mentioned, we reduced our Cree concentration ratio to 338%, while at the same time repurchasing approximately 1% of our shares outstanding. We believe that robust growth in our CNI businesses and operating with a Cree ratio that is lower than 350% will set us apart from the other local banks, which are operating between $375 to $450, and time will be rewarded in the medium to longer term with a higher valuation. Our strong capital position allowed us to structure the Empire transaction with a $30 million cash component, which represents a little more than 50% of the consideration mix for the transaction. The transaction's return metrics for DIME are very strong, with an internal rate of return well in excess of 20%, which is above our cost of capital. The transaction is expected to be approximately 3.5% accretive to earnings on a run rate basis once all synergies have been realized. We expect the impact on our capital ratios from the Empire deal to be approximately 35 basis points, factoring in the full impact of one-time deal costs and the interest rate marks in an elevated rate scenario. Finally, our pro forma capital levels provide us room for both organic growth as well as continued buybacks. Turning next to forward guidance. As usual, while we will not provide any specific guidance on 2027 until our January earnings call, I will provide some thoughts on the remainder of 2026. As I mentioned previously, excluding purchase accounting and prepayment fees, the run rate NIM for the third quarter would have been closer to 332. We would use this 332 NIM as a starting point for modeling purposes going forward. We expect continued NIM expansion in the fourth quarter, driven primarily by loan repricing and secondarily from the recent Federal Reserve rate increase. With respect to rate hikes, we expect the September rate hike to benefit NIM by a couple of basis points, and any future rate hikes will likely be neutral to NIM as they will be a lagging effect on deposit costs. We have repeatedly said our large cash position is a competitive advantage that will allow us to take advantage of lending opportunities as they arise and it will help us create a sustainable NIM that's not subject to cyclical moves based on the trajectory of short-term rates. While it's hard to predict the NIM in individual quarters and the path may not be in a straight line on equal increments, we are focused on the ultimate destination by the fourth quarter of 2027. On our prior earnings call, we discussed a run rate quarterly NIM of over 350 by the end of 2027. Based on our strong performance this quarter and our current pipelines, we believe there's a clearer line of sight to a NIM on our existing balance sheet of over 360 by the end of 2027. Next, I'll turn to expenses. We expect core cash operating expenses, excluding intangible amortization, for the final quarter of the year to be around 66 million. Finally, we expect the tax rate for the final quarter of 2026 to be 28.5%. With that, I'll turn the call back to Shannon, and we'll be happy to take your questions.

Thank you. As a reminder, to ask a question, please press star 11 on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. To withdraw your question, please press star 11 again. Please stand by while we compile the Q&A roster. Our first question comes from the line of Steve Moss with Raymond James. Your line is now open.

Good morning. A nice quarter.

Hey, Steve. How are you?

Hey, Steve. Doing well. Maybe just starting here on the margin, Avi. You know, with that 360 margin by the end of 2027, You know, just kind of curious, I mean, obviously rates are higher here. You know, we've seen some spread compression across the industry. Just maybe just a little updated thoughts in terms of dynamics here around your assumptions to that 360 margin.

Yes, I just want to be clear. We're actually increasing the NIM guidance here. So take your comment. Well, you know, across the industry, there have been some spread compression. We're not seeing that. Here, you know, we've been able to maintain our cost of deposits very close to that, you know, 168 area as we, you know, three weeks into the quarter here. There's been a couple of basis points drift up in deposit costs, but it's actually lower than what we thought. And then on the loan side, in our press release, the weighted average rate on loans was around 550. We've seen that expand to 558 right now sitting here today. So I think we're even more confident sitting here today than we were three months back, which is why we increased the guidance both from a NIM perspective as well as from a NII perspective. And I think that's just a testament to the quality of the deposit base that we have at the bank, the new deposits that are coming into the bank, as well as all of the new business lines that Tom's put in place over the last year and a half, which are now coming to fruition.

You've got to remember, you know, our core DDA now, non-interest-bearing DDA, is now up to over 32%, and it's continuing to grow. The private bankers continue to bring in, you know, new customers, new clients, new relationships. So we're very excited about where we are in terms of, you know, our core funding abilities. And then on the loan side, with all the... The team's in place now, and the vertical's in place. The pipeline's very strong, and they're also bringing a nice chunk of deposits in as well. So we're very comfortable that we're going to continue seeing NIM expansion at these levels.

Right. And just to tie up the margin a little further, in terms of If I recall correctly, it's about $2.5 billion of fixed rate loans at around 4.25% that will reprice next year. Are you guys going to take that up 200 bps at this point?

Yeah, so the $2.5 billion was the number last quarter, Steve. So you've got to roll that forward. So we've had one quarter of, you know, one of those six quarters has gone away. So we're closer to $2 billion. right now, and the rate on those remaining loans around 440 at this point. So yeah, there's still around 200 basis points off of that, you know, in terms of an improvement. You know, Stu said, you know, early on, our pipeline rate right now, it's actually gone up to 650. So, you know, there should be probably, you know, 210 to 225 basis point increase on that $2 billion. Now, all of that's not going to stay with us. Some of that's going to, you know, refi out of the bank. Some of it's going to stay with us. But I think we showed... This quarter that we're able to grow overall loans, keeping in mind the reduction in the multifamily portfolio as well. So you should see the repricing benefit as well as continued growth in the overall loan portfolio at a low to mid-single-digit growth rate that we talked about last time around.

In the previous quarters, you've been seeing about $150 to $175 million of commercial real estate move out. So you have to assume that that will continue most likely. And it's been about $150 million a quarter. and Moffitt Family has been prepaying or paying off and refinancing out. So we're still seeing those same metrics, although in a higher rate environment, it might slow down a little bit.

Okay, that's helpful. That was going to be my next question. And then maybe just on the core deposit growth here, it was really strong this quarter. Just kind of curious, you know, how you're thinking about the cadence here on growth and, you know, any call you can give there.

Yep. I mean, Steve, typically the third and fourth quarters of the year are our best quarters, just given, you know, seasonality, you know, the East End, you know, some of our, you know, private banks in terms of the type of business mix that they have. So, I would say there's nothing in the numbers in Q3 that we expect to go away in Q4, so it's a good starting point. And then, you know, we've started the quarter, you know, reasonably here. So I would say it's kind of hard to predict in individual quarters where we go. Q1, generally, we do see some outflows, but I think, you know, Q4 should steadily build off of Q3. Okay.

I appreciate all the call here, and I'll step back in the queue, guys. Thank you very much. Thank you.

Our next question comes from the line of Manuel Navas with Piper Sandler. Your line is now open.

Hey, good morning. I hear you on the low single digits, mid single digits growth pace. It was really strong this quarter. Can you talk a little bit about the mix this quarter, how it accelerated a bit? And I guess the pace should maybe slow a little bit in the fourth quarter, but can you just talk about the growth trajectory What businesses drove it most?

Yeah, sure. So a couple of things. So if you go back and take a look at the year, right, on the business loan side, Q1, Net Loan Growth was about 125 million. Q2 was 275 and then Q3 was 350. So nice chronology of growth across the year and across the quarters. The fourth quarter, I think, is probably going to be flat to where we were in this quarter. Q1 tends to be lower just by the nature of the business. Q2 and Q3 tends to be stronger, as you know, in banking and and a few more just depends on the overall economic environment and the momentum. So we feel pretty good about where we think we'll end the year. To Stu's point about the 925 million or so growth year over year, what we're really happy about is the diversification of that growth. Our C&I business, our traditional C&I business led the way at about 25% and then when you start to add in some of the new specialty finance businesses we put in place like Lender Finance, Fund Finance, Sponsor Finance, and Health Care, they all came in at about 20%. So we're really happy. We didn't have one business that, you know, pretty much outshined the others. And when you look about the quarter, the quarter had about one-third growth from CNI, followed by Fund Finance, and then the balance of the other specialty groups fell behind. So real diverse business growth across the year and across the quarter.

Yeah, Manuel, I just add a couple of things, right? I think our guidance still, when you go back to last quarter, you know, think about the balance sheet in three different pieces. So on the business loan front, you know, really somewhere between $200 and $250 million every quarter. This quarter, we were at $350, so probably a little bit higher in terms of the run rate. The multifamily piece, we still expect around $500 million of runoff on that piece. And then What changed this quarter, which is why overall loans grew, is we're back in the commercial real estate market doing relationship CRE. CRE balances were down, you know, only $10 or $15 million this quarter. We probably originated $100 million this quarter at, you know, nice spreads, nice LTVs, nice debt service. So that should continue going forward. So where the variable is going to be going forward is, you know, business loans, you know, some quarters it may be closer to $200, some quarters maybe closer to $250, some it may be closer to $300. over there. But when you put all of that together, you come back to that low to mid single digits for the next probably six to nine months.

Great. And that 500 million multifamily decline, that gets you towards that 25% longer-term target. No shift there, in essence, on the mix projected going forward?

Yeah, I mean, it's probably a little bit less than 25. I mean, right now we're at 27%. So, you know, I would use $500 million off of the current numbers, basically.

I appreciate that. And is there any other color you could add on kind of the deposit growth, which was so strong, kind of what areas that came from most? I know you talked a little bit about the private banker business mix, and you talked a little bit about the trajectory over the course of the year. but just what businesses led it most and where there might be some competition.

Yeah, I mean, where we're really growing deposits is just business deposits, right? So if you look at our base, right now it's probably 70% to 75% of the base is business deposits and consumer deposits are 25%. The consumer piece this time last year was 30%, you know, this time two years back was probably 35%. So we're actually seeing, you know, small declines on the consumer side because we're not the highest rate payers out there for consumer deposits, which really means business deposits are growing at an even faster pace, right? So we did hire three teams earlier this year in April. They're doing really well in line with our projections. So it takes a little bit of time for teams to get going, but they were a good contributor to third quarter growth. Our municipal business did really well in the third quarter. Our branches did well. I would say, look, we think we've got the best footprint in our area. We've got the best bankers. We've got the best branch network. We've hired the best private bankers. So it's really the people that we have. And Stu said we're able to do this with growing DDA, right? So we're bringing in core operating accounts. I mean, we've opened, you know, over the course of this year, we've opened over 6,000 accounts, basically. So, a lot of what's coming in now is, you know, the work that was done over the last three to six months, and we continue to see that accounting opening process not stop. So, I think, you know, this quarter was, you know, especially strong in the third quarter, but, you know, fourth quarter, you know, we'll have to see where we end up at. I will say we have been able to manage the cost of funds really well, and we're not really seeing a creep up in that yet.

Yeah, that does bode well. And my last question is, you've added now Staten Island. with the transaction today. You've grown an affordable business vertical. What is remaining for where you'd like to add density? Perhaps another team by next April. What is it you're looking at next as like to have in terms of a new lending vertical or a new geographic area you'd like to invest in?

Look, I think we've kind of accomplished what we were set out to do in terms of verticals and business lines. You know, we've been opportunistic when the opportunity arises and talented people become available. We've taken the opportunity to bring them on board, and we've been successful at it. The same thing with private banking teams. There are probably still a few out there that we'd be interested in. But I think overall, strategically, I think it's really now we need to operate on all cylinders and get things cranky, and I think we're really about there. A lot of these teams have been on for quite a while, and their pipelines are growing, and that's why you're seeing the results in terms of Long Originations, and Closing. Strategically, I think we're really in a spot where we really got to execute and grow the business. I think we have the horses and the manpower to do that now. I don't see any significant moves away from that. We will be opportunistic if an opportunity arises in terms of teams or verticals.

One thing to think about is when we bring a new team on, it takes them anywhere from a year to 18 months to really get their footing. You can tell by the loan growth results, many of those teams are just starting to get there now. It's nice to see that the investment that we put into the business a year or so are starting to come to fruition. We just want to keep pushing that for now and focusing on the organic side.

Yeah, Manuel, I just rounded out by saying we're very focused on getting our profitability to a level by the back half of 27, where you're talking about an ROA in excess of 130 at that point. And so you saw this quarter with the efficiency ratios sub 48% at this point. We've updated our NIM guidance where we think NIM guidance is going to be over 360 at that point. We've made all the investments. Anything going forward is probably marginal and pays for itself pretty quick. But as Stu said, right now it's about execution and driving the profitability to reflect the value in our deposit base, which is still not in terms of the overall profitability because there's so much repricing assets that we have over the next five quarters.

I really appreciate the commentary. Thank you.

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of David Conrad with KBW. Your line is now open.

David Conrad Great. Thanks. Good morning. I just want to talk about credit for a little bit. You know, you mentioned criticizing special, mentioned it was down high single digits, but you also mentioned the NPA growth was pretty strong this quarter. It looks like partially in business loans and multifamily. A little bit of color of the MPA moves and then maybe expectations in the fourth quarter for provisions and maybe MPAs as well.

Yes, well, I'll take that, David. So, on the C9 side, we had one relationship. This had been substandard for a couple of years with us. We took, you know, $6 million specific reserve on this. We have some collateral behind it as well. We feel pretty well secured over there. Person was involved, you know, in property management, you know, kind of tied to the real estate space over there. On the multifamily side, one relationship, this had been in the 60 to 89 day bucket for the last two years, slow paying relationship, and so we kind of charged that down. got an updated appraisal on that. So I'd say, look, it's part and parcel of the business that we have. You know, substandard loans were down 7%. The 30 to 89-day bucket was down substantially. You'll see those disclosures in the 10-Q when we put that out. Look, I would just say overall in terms of provisioning levels, we'd probably expect something similar to the last couple of quarters for the next couple of quarters. Our goal really is to get the earning stream of this company to 130 plus ROA by the back half of 2020. and many more. Thank you. And then one more.

The operating leverage story here has been pretty remarkable, and you're at an efficiency ratio roughly around 48, a little bit better than 48%. I know expenses are going up a little bit for the fourth quarter, but is that sustainable? It feels like it is when you're talking about more 30 bps better NIM expansion next year. How much can you drive that operating leverage?

Yes, I'd use that $66 million as a, you know, reasonable run rate for next year. And then if you assume, you know, 3%, 4%-ish, you know, regular merit increase type stuff, look, it depends, right? I think we've done the heavy lifting on the expense side in terms of Building out the infrastructure to support the private bank. We've opened two new branches. We've gone into New Jersey. We've added a lot of teams underneath Tom. So I think all of that's done. So going forward, our goal is to get that 48% down to 45% and then lower than 45% down the road. So I think expenses are what they are. You know, additional scale with the Ampire deal, which we've not talked about, you know, that should help the efficiency ratio as well, given, you know, given the fact that, you know, a lot of the back office, you know, we're able to support with what we have right here. So we should see that, you know, continuing to trend down over time, you know, mainly driven by revenue growth.

Great. Thank you. Appreciate it.

Thank you. As a reminder, to ask a question at this time, please press star 1-1 on your touch-tone telephone. Our next question comes from the line of Matthew Brees with Stevens. Your line is now open.

Matthew Brees Hey, good morning.

A few questions from me.

Just starting on the MPA pickup, you know, within multifamily, you know, how much of that was tied to the rent-regulated space? And Avi, maybe You could give us just an update on the health of that portfolio from an NPL and delinquency standpoint. And then secondly, I was just curious, I heard you on substandard. What did classified loans do this quarter and any kind of directional change there?

Yeah, sure. So the relationship, this quarter, Matt, that was rent regulated. The NPAs that we have in the book are all rent regulated on the multifamily side. Anything that's free market, you know, we don't have anything there that's NPA at this point. I'd say, look, overall, we're monitoring the portfolio, you know, very closely. What we really spend a lot of time on is, you know, There's a billion dollars-ish overall of rent regulated, which is over 50% basically is how we characterize it, right? So that portfolio, this past quarter, there was probably around $40 million of a decline in that. So we're seeing a steady decline in that portfolio, specifically in the multifamily portfolio. So classified actually is substandard. That's the definition, right? So in that particular portfolio on the multifamily side, overall we have around $135 million of substandard. Last quarter, it's down to probably $125 million this quarter. So we're not seeing any pickup there. We know our portfolio. We know what we got. Could there be some hits over time? Sure. But by and large, it's very manageable. Our average loan size is around $3.5 million in the overall multifamily portfolio. On the rent-regulated side, it's less than that. Our pre-2019 portfolio that we keep our eyes on is down $275 million. We feel good about that. You know, it's winding down. It's not a growth part of our business. We're not doing any new rent regulated loans at this point. And I think, you know, we've reached the point where our earnings power is so strong that, you know, we'll work through anything that comes up over time.

Great. I appreciate all that. And then just on deposit costs, Avi, I heard you say it's coming in better than expected. I'm just curious, as you think about that, you know, 360 or North NIMH by year end 27. What kind of deposit beta are you anticipating?

Yes, I think on the first rate hike that happened, Matt, we've not seen much over there. There's obviously clients we've moved. I think as we see a pickup in rate increases, you're going to see the beta be a bit higher on the deposit side. I don't think it's going to be any different than on the way down. The one difference I think is that, you know, the DDA that we have, I mean, right now it's real DDA, it's real operating accounts, it's real stuff that's been coming into the bank. So I think the last time around rates went to 5%. The issue that a lot of banks had was there's a lot of migration out of DDA into interest bearing. We just don't see that happening this time around, right? So I think for the second rate hike, if there's one in, you know, October or December, you'll see, you know, a bigger pickup than the first hike. But on the first hike here, We ended the quarter with a cost of deposit of $168. We're sitting here today at $172 plus or minus. And yeah, there'll be a little bit more creep off the $172, but not substantial. I do think on the second and third, it'll probably pick up a little bit off of that. Which is why, if you go back to my guidance on the NIM, we said the first rate hike was probably a couple basis points accretive to NIM. And then once you get to the second one, we're probably more neutral on NIM at that point. Yeah, that makes sense.

And then the other, you know, also tying to the NIM outlook, you guys are sitting on a lot of cash, things up to 14% of total assets. Can you help me out with kind of the deployment strategy there and timeframe for deployment and within that ROA target you have and the 360 NIM guide, you know, what does the cash as a percentage of assets look like?

Yeah, so I think we like the cash position because it keeps us neutral to short-term rates at this point. In the third quarter, we did not buy any securities. So I think we'd like to have a little bit more visibility into where rates end up at before jumping in and buying securities. So I think that 316M really doesn't assume much deployment of the cash position. It's just off the $2 billion odd of maturing and repricing loans, if you assume, let's call it $1.7 billion, $1.8 billion of that, you can reprice up 200, 225 basis points. That itself should get us You know, 25 basis points, 20-25 basis points of NIM off of that. I think that the cash deployment, that's something over and above. That, but if you come back to our loan growth, you know, assumptions, we've said, you know, low to mid single digit growth on the loan side, and we're growing deposits, you know, faster than a low to mid single digit growth. So that would really mean there's more cash on the balance sheet, right? So long story short, it doesn't really capture that. I think that's upside in the NIM. And another way to look at it is if we did deploy it, the 360 is more like, you know, 383, 94% if we ran with the loan to deposit ratio closer to 90 to 95.

Okay. Do you think cash could build from here? I didn't really anticipate that, but it sounds like you might be leading me there.

No, look, if you look at it this quarter, the loan-to-deposit ratio went down, even though we grew loans, because we grew deposits faster, right? So it is a possibility, but, you know, we'll deal with it as it comes.

Yeah, once we get to a point, Matt, where we're comfortable with our CRE ratio and We're back in a Cree business today on a selective basis. You'll see larger loan growth and then the deployment of the cash. But at this point, you're still seeing net runoff on the commercial real estate side, both on the multifamily and obviously on the straight commercial real estate. Once that kind of levels out, at that point, and we expect that toward, you know, mid to late 27, you'll start to see, you know, more significant loan growth and deployment of more cash.

Okay. Last one for me, Avi, just on the deal, there was a few numbers I was hoping you could help me out with. Maybe forecasted cost saves, the percentage you're using for CDI and then the Credit Interest Rate Marks.

Oh, and one thing.

Sorry.

Yeah, sure. So the deal size is pretty small, right? You know, 4% of our asset base. So, you know, I think overall we, you know, we expect to run this, you know, at a ROA, you know, well in excess of 2% at the bank. You know, we fully factor in cost savings over there. The rate mark and credit mark, you probably end up somewhere close to somewhere between 4% and 5% plus or minus, including the rate and credit mark. Obviously, rates are elevated, so it depends on what point in time you do it. We kind of assumed the worst case where the 5-year was at 5%. So I think to include that, it's probably somewhere between 4.5% and 5% rate and credit put together on it. In terms of the CDI assumption, I'll just use 3% on the core deposits on that. And then deal costs, they probably should be in the $12 to $13 million area, plus or minus, on a pre-tax basis.

Great. I'll leave it there. Thank you for taking all my questions. Appreciate it. Okay. Thanks, Matt.

Thank you, and I'm currently showing no further questions at this time. I'd now like to turn the call back over to Stuart Lubow for closing remarks.

Thank you, Shannon, and thank you all and our dedicated employees and our shareholders for their continued support, and we look forward to speaking with you after our fourth quarter.

This concludes today's conference. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect.