Thank you for joining us. Please refer to the company's forward-looking statement on slide 19 of this presentation, as well as the risk factors described in the company's SEC filings. The company will also discuss both GAAP and certain non-GAAP financial measures. For reconciliations, please refer to the company's earnings press release and SEC filings. I'd now like to turn the call over to Denis Sheahan, Eastern Chief Executive Officer.

Thank you. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us. On the call today with me are Executive Chair and Chair of the Board of Directors Bob Rivers, President and Chief Operating Officer Quincy Miller, and our Chief Financial Officer David Rosato. We're pleased with our third quarter performance, which reflects disciplined execution of our priorities. We delivered record operating earnings, generated attractive returns, maintained Excellent asset quality and returned meaningful capital to shareholders, all while continuing to drive organic growth across both our banking and fee-based businesses. These results further reinforce Eastern Standing as a premier bank in Greater Boston, one of the nation's largest and most affluent banking markets. The increase in period and loan balances was primarily driven by strong commercial real estate originations, and broad-based CNI growth. As expected, Cree payoffs moderated from the second quarter, leading to solid growth overall in commercial real estate. Commercial loan pipelines remain strong, although the pace of closings has been somewhat slower than anticipated, as some clients take a more measured approach to investment decisions amid interest rate uncertainty. Overall, Customers remain resilient as business activity continues to generate demand for financing. We believe there are a lot of opportunities in the commercial banking segment, and we are well positioned to gain share. Customers value our ability to deliver a broad set of commercial capabilities typically associated with larger institutions, while also providing the certainty of execution that comes from local decision making and knowledge. The Eastern brand is highly regarded across our market, and the franchise is deeply rooted. We live and work here, and our extensive involvement in the communities we serve resonates with customers. On the funding side, hearing end deposits grew modestly despite seasonal municipal outflows. While the deposit environment remains competitive and costs move higher, We remain committed to gathering core deposits to support our growth strategy and balancing these efforts with margin performance. Importantly, the strength of our core deposit base and limited reliance on wholesale funding provide us with the flexibility to stay disciplined while also supporting customer relationships. Wealth management is an important component of our long-term growth strategy, and we achieved another successful quarter. Assets under management and administration increased from the end of the second quarter, driven by both positive net flows and market appreciation. Our comprehensive team-based approach continues to differentiate us across our target market of $2 million to $20 million in investable assets. We offer a level of service to this segment that larger firms typically cannot deliver. Importantly, We get compensated well for these services with an average fee ratio of approximately 70 basis points. While we're in the early stages of capitalizing on the full potential of this business, the increasing alignment between our wealth and banking teams, combined with the attractive wealth demographics across our footprint, is generating meaningful momentum and we are encouraged about its long-term outlook. Our asset quality remains a clear source of strength, reflecting conservative underwriting and proactive risk management. Net charge-offs declined link quarter and, as anticipated, non-performing loans improved for the third consecutive quarter following the HarborOne merger. We are confident in our credit profile, including the sectors that have received greater attention in Boston, such as life science, which we have limited exposure. We know our investor office portfolio exceptionally well, and it represents only 4% of total loans. The portfolio is well reserved and continues to perform within our expectations. While overall credit trends remain favorable, our experienced credit team continues to actively monitor the macro environment and local market for emerging risks that could impact our customers, positioning us to respond quickly and decisively when needed. Finally, given our profitability, we continue to generate capital in excess of our growth needs. As we have consistently communicated, we are committed to thoughtfully rightsizing our capital position over time. That commitment was evident again this quarter as we returned meaningful capital to shareholders through both share repurchases and quarterly dividend while continuing to support organic growth opportunities. As always, Our results reflect the efforts of an exceptional team and I want to thank our colleagues for their continued commitment and execution. I also want to express my gratitude to our customers for choosing Eastern as their financial partner and to shareholders for their ongoing trust and support. We never take these relationships for granted and every day we are focused on delivering strong, sustainable performance and value for all stakeholders. David, I'll hand it over to you to provide further details on third quarter financials.

Thanks, Dennis, and good morning, everyone. Our third quarter financial performance was strong and highlighted by record operating net income, further improvement in key profitability metrics, including return on average assets and return on average tangible common equity, positive operating leverage driven by an increase in net interest income and lower expenses, Solid balance sheet growth supported by strong commercial lending activity, sustained excellent asset quality, and meaningful capital returns to shareholders. The third quarter also benefited from a modestly lower effective tax rate, primarily reflecting a higher level of tax-preferenced items. Going forward, we expect the effective tax rate to return to about 22%. We reported record operating net income of $111 million, or 51 cents per diluted share, an increase of 4% link quarter and 50% from a year ago, reflecting the enhanced earnings power of the company. Net interest income growth, combined with well-controlled expenses, produced another quarter of positive operating leverage. As a result, the operating efficiency ratio improved to 47.5%, contributing to a three basis point increase in operating ROAA to 141 basis points and a 37 basis point improvement in operating return on average tangible common equity to 15.7% compared to the second quarter. Total revenue of $306.6 million increased 1% link quarter as growth in net interest income was offset by lower fee income. Starting with slide five of the presentation, net interest income grew 2% link quarter, reflecting the benefit of continued balance sheet growth. Net interest margin declined four basis points to 362, which was in line with our expectations as higher funding costs more than offset improvement in asset yields. Asset yields increased two basis points driven by favorable loan and securities repricing while interest bearing liability costs rose eight basis points due to higher deposit costs. Net discount accretion contributed 26 basis points to the margin compared to 28 basis points in the prior quarter. Excluding accretion, the margin declined two basis points, link quarter. Importantly, our year-to-date net interest margin of 364 remains well within our full-year guidance range of 360 to 365. While the benefits of a steeper yield curve and higher rates are supporting asset repricing, Those tailwinds continue to be offset by competitive deposit pricing. As a result, we currently expect net interest margin to remain relatively stable in the fourth quarter and to modestly improve into next year. We show the repricing characteristics of our interest earning assets on slide six. We have approximately $8.8 billion of floating rate assets repricing constantly with short-term rates. Beyond that, we expect approximately $1 billion of fixed rate variable assets repricing in the fourth quarter and roughly $800 million per quarter in 2027. As detailed on slide 7, operating non-interest income decreased $5.2 million, or 16%, compared to a particularly strong second quarter results. The largest contributor to the variance was a $6.3 million decrease in income from investments per employee retirement benefits, reflecting weaker equity market performance. This unfavorable impact on fee income was partially offset by a $2.5 million reduction in related benefit costs reported in non-interest expense. Miscellaneous income and fees also decreased $3.1 million largely as the result of gains on the sale of commercial loans recognized in Q2 that did not reoccur in Q3. Turning to wealth management on slide eight, assets under administration increased to $11.6 billion, including $10.8 billion in assets under management. AUM increased $156 million link quarter primarily driven by $97 million in positive net flows, highlighting the continued momentum in the business. Wealth management fees declined modestly from the prior quarter as growth in AUM revenues was more than offset by lower tax preparation fees, which are seasonally higher in the second quarter. Compared to Q3 25, fees increased 10% reflecting strong organic and market-driven asset growth over the last year. As detailed on slide nine, the third quarter demonstrated our ongoing focus on prudent expense management and operating efficiency as non-interest expense decreased $8.3 million or 5% linked quarter. Notably, we did not incur any non-operating costs in the current quarter compared to $1.6 million in Q2. On an operating basis, non-interest expense was down $6.7 million. The current quarter benefited from the following, $2.2 million decrease in salaries and employee benefits, primarily due to lower costs related to employee retirement benefits that I referenced earlier. A $1.9 million decrease in occupancy and equipment expenses reflecting lower depreciation and maintenance costs. A $1.8 million decrease in professional services primarily due to shareholder advisory fees in Q2 that did not reoccur in the third quarter. And a $1.9 million decrease in other operating expenses largely driven by of unfunded commitment reserves. These declines in non-interest expense were partially offset by a $1 million increase in FDIC insurance costs. Moving to the balance sheet, starting with deposits on slide 10. Period end balances increased $98 million linked quarter despite seasonal municipal outflows. On an average basis, deposits increased $667 million, or 2.6% from the second quarter. Consistent with recent trends, money market balances continued to grow as customers maintained a preference for liquidity. Total deposit costs of 156 basis points increased nine basis points linked quarter with a September spot rate of 159 basis points, reflecting elevated competition for deposits in the New England market. In response to higher short-term rates, we took targeted actions to appropriately position offerings to defend and grow market share. Looking ahead, we remain focused on gathering core deposits while balancing growth with margin performance. Looking at loans on slide 11, period end balances increased $261 million for 1.1% link quarter. Cree balances grew $229 million, supported by strong originations, although payoffs remained a headwind, despite moderating from Q2 levels. CNI balances increased $93 million, reflecting broad-based growth across the portfolio and continued client activity. Commercial pipelines remained strong and ended September at approximately $1 billion, with a balance mix between Cree and CNI. Earning to consumer lending. Home equity balances increased $44 million, Given the strong underlying demand across our footprint for this product, we continue to see home equity as an attractive area of growth. Residential mortgage balances were up modestly from Q2. However, our expectation is the residential portfolio will remain relatively flat in 2026 as we favor HELOC and commercial loan growth. Moving to slide 13, our capital position remains strong. is indicated by CET1 and TCE ratios of 13% and 9.6%, respectively. We are focused on right-sizing capital through organic growth, share repurchases, and quarterly dividends. We expect to continue to generate excess capital but are managing our CET1 towards the median of the KRS. Tangible book value per share of $12.96 declined 1% link quarter, primarily driven by higher unrealized losses in the available per sale securities portfolio reflected in AOCI. Excluding this mark-to-market impact, Tangible book value per share would have increased approximately 2% from Q2 despite returning $89.1 million of capital to shareholders during the quarter. In addition to $32.4 million of cash dividends paid, we repurchased 2.6 million shares for $56.7 million at an average price of $22.11 which was 30 cents below the BWAP for the quarter. As a result, our diluted common shares outstanding were $215.5 million as of September 30th. Worth quarter to date, we have also repurchased an additional 1.6 million shares through yesterday for a total cost of $33.8 million. and now have 8.5 million shares remaining in our authorization that runs through the end of 2027. We continue to view our buyback through two lenses, core and opportunistic. The core component reflects our need to consistently repurchase shares to steadily reduce capital levels. The opportunistic component is more price sensitive. as we remain disciplined and focused on creating value for shareholders. As a result, the pace of repurchases may vary from quarter to quarter based on market conditions and the stock's valuation. While we control capital generation and the pace of buybacks, we do not control valuation. As displayed on slide 14, asset quality remains excellent. Net charge-offs to average total loans of nine basis points declined from 17 basis points in Q2, and NPLs improved by $24.6 million to $84.8 million, or 36 basis points of total loans. Notably, NPLs continued to improve in both the Legacy Eastern and Acquired Harbor One portfolios. Commercial criticized and classified loans increased modestly from the second quarter, reflecting higher balances in both the Legacy Eastern and HarborOne portfolios. The increase was primarily driven by a small number of relationships. To conclude, our third quarter results underscore the strength of the franchise. We generated record operating net income, produced positive operating leverage, and maintained excellent asset quality, all while executing against our priorities of growing organically and returning capital to shareholders. As we look ahead, we remain encouraged by the underlying momentum across the franchise. At the same time, we continue to operate in a dynamic environment characterized by elevated deposit competition, evolving interest rate expectations, Thank you. Thank you.

At this time, if you would like to ask a question, simply press star followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. If you would like to withdraw your question, press star one again. We'll pause for just a moment to compile the Q&A roster. Your first question comes from the line of Damon Del Monte with Keefe, Briette, and Woods. Damon, your line is open. Please go ahead.

Hey, good morning, guys. Hope everybody's doing well today. And thanks for taking my questions. I just want to start off on loan growth, kind of around the commentary with the C&I outlook with kind of a bit of a pause from customers. I'm just wondering if that impacts your outlook for the full year at all, or if you think you're still on track for your updated guide that you provided last quarter.

Damon, good morning. Thanks for joining us. Pipelines still remain very robust. Actually, the CNI segment is the largest component of our pipeline overall, so we feel really good about that. But certainly, the increase in interest rates, as you might expect, has an impact. More conversations with clients about the fact that rates have gone up. And so it does slow things down somewhat, but we're still optimistic overall. And certainly regarding the targets we provided for this year. As we look ahead into next year, we'll have to reassess and we'll provide new guidance at the beginning of the year in terms of once we've had more time to digest the higher rate environment, what our outlook for 27 would be.

Okay, great. And then on the CRE side, are you seeing similar trends with payoffs kind of moderating so far here in the fourth quarter? Well, certainly, speak to the third quarter, payoffs did moderate.

We did expect them to. You know, if we go back to the beginning of the year, we did expect elevated payoffs in part because of the environment, but also because of the Harbor One merger. And as we anticipated in Q3, they did modify somewhat, although at an elevated level overall. But in a higher rate environment, yes, we would expect payoffs to slow to some degree.

Okay, great. And then just one for David. On securities, the average securities this quarter were up linked quarter. Could you just remind us, was that kind of a full quarter impact from activity in the second quarter, or were those purchases here in the third quarter?

It was both, Damon. So we cash flow about $40 million a month, which we have been reinvesting this year, plus we've added to that both last quarter and this quarter.

Okay. And can we expect there to be a little bit more growth in the securities portfolio? Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah, sorry. And I think that that trend of reinvestment and net growth, net modest growth will continue into Q4.

Okay, great. Okay, that's all that I had for now. I'll step back. Thank you.

Thanks.

All right.

Thanks, Damon.

Your next question comes from the line of Justin Crowley with Piper Sandler. Justin, your line is open. Please go ahead.

Hey, good morning, everyone. I was wondering if you could frame up for us the state of play on the deposit side a bit more. And I think you kind of alluded to this, David, but it sounds like it's your sense that competition, and I suppose yourselves included, moved on rate just in advance of this timber hike. or could that be less of the case and we could see a longer lag here, especially if we think about a couple more hikes that may be on the way? How are you thinking about that going forward?

Yeah, it's the million-dollar question, Justin. The deposit pressure continues. I would say it's broadened out from smaller banks to larger regionals as well. We think it's going to continue into Q4 and into next year if we do in fact see another 75 basis points of tightening from the Fed. The good news from our perspective is, and we called it out in our comments, the billion dollars of fixed rate asset repricing in Q4 and the $800 million or so acquired next year, we believe that The fixed rate asset repricing will outpace deposit cost increases, leading to a slightly better margin. But we underestimated deposit pricing in Q3, frankly, as you can see in our results. Our Q margin, if you adjust for a little slowdown in accretion in the residential mortgage portfolio, was down two basis points.

Okay, got it. That's helpful. And then just, you know, flipping to the lending side, you know, you talked about higher rates and what it's doing as far as customers, some of the uncertainty, but curious for you folks, and not that you go that far out on the risk spectrum, but just if you guys at all are tightening up the credit box in a meaningful way, and if there are just some deals that don't work with the moving interest rates.

Well, you know, we can give you a couple of examples of just talking to a senior lender about this of loans that sort of had to be reworked because of the change in interest rates. And it's a combination of, as you'd imagine, with higher rates, the debt service coverage ratio changes. So that requires that the borrower has to put in more equity to meet to satisfy our requirements. and that happened in that situation. Perhaps in some other situations it may not. The other thing that has an effect here is With higher rates, sometimes the sale price of a property would need to be renegotiated modestly to accommodate for the buyer's need to pay a higher rate on the loan. So those things have an effect, and they can have an effect on the speed to close those loans. It can also have an effect on demand. But we've been through this before, different rate cycles, and I'm confident in the team's ability to sort of weather through this period.

Justin, I would just add to that because our credit box is fairly tight and conservative, our customer base has the ability to put up more equity in the example that Dennis cited rather than a more highly levered client base who doesn't have that ability. So on a relative basis, I think we have a better ability to manage through this.

OK, great. That makes sense. And then just one last one. You guys have done a lot of work on improving asset quality. You called that out and and maybe selectively moving some credits out of the bank. You know, if we think about the acquired portfolio. So I guess I'm curious where you think you are there. And as you know, the legwork basically complete at this point, there's there's still a little room left to go.

I think we're, you know, we feel like we're on track. As we mentioned at the beginning of the year, we knew we'd have sort of an increase in the non-performing assets, non-accrual loans, and we'd work our way through it. So if you look at our level of non-performers at the end of the quarter, 36 basis points. That's a pretty normalized level. And so we think we're through most of the issues we needed to work through on the acquired portfolio.

Yeah, as Dennis says, we're right on track. There's probably another quarter in the Q1 at most of working through that portfolio. As you can see, that 36 basis points Dennis reference. It is essentially half Harbor One and half Legacy split right down the middle.

Got it. Great. I will leave it there. Thank you guys so much. Thank you, Justin.

Your next question comes from the line of Fetty Strickland with Hufty Group. Fetty, your line is open. Please go ahead.

Hey, good morning. Wanted to clarify on the directional VIN guide. Thanks, David, for that. But does that include any rate hikes? And does the fixed rate repricing story still outpace funding costs in a scenario where we get what's called two more hikes over the next couple quarters?

Yes, good question, Fetty. Yes, it does include additional rate hikes. And the conclusion still holds.

Okay. And then just one more piece to that. Just again, I appreciate the detail on the fixed rate asset repricing. Can you give us a sense for the rate that you're able to get on the new securities purchases as well as kind of where these loans are repricing up to?

Well, on the securities portfolio, if you look in the page that we have there, we've been able to drive up security purchases on average about 10 basis points a quarter through the last year. Some quarters a little higher, some quarters a little lower. We're putting in, depending what asset class you're talking about, whether it's mortgage backs, which we're primarily doing hybrid arms or municipal bonds, you're putting in yields at 6% to 6.5% dependent on asset class. So quite additive to the portfolio. And then the second part of your question was just on the loan side. And with as much talk about competition on loan spreads, we're actually seeing Loan spreads, for the most part, being held relatively stable. So you're talking 175 to 200 basis points across our bread and butter Cree and C&I portfolios. It's where we're really seeing spread competition is what I would call the larger, more marquee names in the markets that also would have strong fee income opportunities.

Got it. That's helpful. Thank you. And just one more from me just on expenses. Are there any items that could meaningfully add to the expense base in the fourth quarter? And directionally, as we think out for 27, just given the step down in expenses in the third quarter, could we potentially see expenses either flat or maybe even slightly lower for the year? I'm just trying to get a sense for where they could go.

I would caution you a touch there. I would expect expenses to tick up a bit in Q4 relative to Q3. We kind of went, you know, the investment advisory fees that we called out. Linkwater drove that down. That's not repeatable. Maintenance. Operating expense there was a little below trend. I would think more about the average of the second and third quarter, which puts that expense base, call it 163, 164 in that neighborhood.

All right, perfect. Thank you so much. I'll step back.

Your next question comes from the line of Tyler Cacciatore with Stevens. Tyler, your line is open. Please go ahead.

Hey, good morning. This is Tyler. I'm from Adbris. Hi, Tyler. Good morning. I was wondering if you could talk a little bit about the loan-to-deposit ratio. I know the seasonal muni outflows played a role this quarter, but is there any level you start to pull back on loan growth if deposit growth doesn't keep pace, or is that not really a constraint you're focused on today?

If you look over many years, our loan-to-deposit ratio has ticked up, but if you look at our 930 balance sheet, we have $2 billion more deposits than we have loans today. and we've made comments about our residential mortgage portfolio being a little larger than normal because of acquisition. So we're certainly focused on growing our deposit base to fund loan growth, but we're not at a point where we believe it would be a constraint on loan growth.

Okay, great. And then just one more quick one. Do you happen to have the spot cost of deposits maybe a quarter end or in the month of September?

Yeah, we do. So it was 156, as we said, for the quarter. We ended September at 159.

Okay, great. That'll be it for me. Thank you very much. All right. Thank you.

Your next question comes from the line of Lori Hunsicker with Seaport Research Partners. Lori, your line is open. Please go ahead. Yeah.

Hi. Thanks. Good morning. Thanks for taking my questions. Just staying on margin, by the way, I love slide six. That's super helpful. Spot margin, do you have that?

Sure. The spot margin for September was 362. Okay, great.

And then just going back to expenses more broadly, you know, and I realize you haven't yet given guidance for next year, but can you help us think about where you all sit in terms of sort of a tech AI spend relative to where you were this year and then branch rationalization, which is something that certainly some of your peers are looking at. How do you approach that?

Thanks. So we're certainly focused. We have seen Tech AI spend go up this year modestly. We're in the middle of a budget process where we are seeing increased ask for tech spend and people to support that tech spend. At the end of the day, we will be able to absorb that in our full expense base in a manner that puts year-over-year expenses well under control. They will increase, and they will increase modestly, but we don't think the tech AI spend is – we're going to be sitting here in January delivering bad news on the expense line.

And then I'll jump in. As far as your question about branch rationalization, we don't have a program you referred that some others may have of and many more.

Just very high level. Dennis, maybe you can comment. I think we know the answer, but just would like to hear you say it. Whole Bank M&A, where do you sit on that at the moment?

Thanks. Laurie, our position remains the same as it has been for quite some time. We're focused on, we're very pleased to deliver a nice clean quarter with sort of no non-operating items as David referenced. Thanks so much. Thanks, Lauren. As a reminder, if you would like to ask a question, simply press star followed by the number one on your telephone keypad.

Your next question comes from the line of Jared Shaw with Barclays Capital. Jared, your line is open. Please go ahead.

Thanks, everybody. Should we assume with the removal of the guidance slide, are you removing guidance? Or how should we think about guidance from last quarter?

Yeah, Jared, I did. Chuck Holt to myself when I read your note last night. Our practice is guidance in January, bid year update in July, not quarterly guidance. So there really wasn't, we haven't removed anything. That's just what our practice is.

Okay. So it's not, so what was left from July is still, so we can call that still the current guidance?

100%. And I slightly referenced that in the comments around the margin. You know, even though the margin was down, it's still within that guidance. But we have not changed any of our thoughts for full year 26 relative to what we put out in July.

Other than your earlier comments during Q&A, you referenced expenses in Q4, the tax rate. So, Jared, largely it's the same guidance.

Got it. Okay. Thanks for that. And then what are your thoughts on expected beta given the changed rate outlook and the competition that you referenced? How should we think about your thoughts of deposit beta through the cycle here?

Yeah. So again, a really important question. Our goal, our thought today is will be able to achieve the historic 50% deposit betas that we did in the last up cycle. Every one of these cycles is different, as we all know. What's different this cycle is the industry moved before the Fed moved, right? That's kind of what we're experiencing on deposit costs last quarter and slightly in Q1. Q2. It's the level of deposit competition, which is also driven by the level of loan demand, ultimately is going to control that beta. But there's nothing other than the fact that the industry moves sooner. That should be different this cycle. The deposit power of our franchise is only stronger now than it has been in the past. as were bigger and more important in our market. So we stand by the historical averages we've been able to achieve, which is essentially a 50% beta. Okay.

All right. Thanks. And then just finally for me, any update on the competitive environment on commercial with some of the consolidation that we've seen? Is that flowing through to the The potential to see some movement among borrowers.

Jared, yes, certainly there has been a change in the competitive environment with some of the consolidation that's happened. We've been able to attract talent to our company. We're very pleased with that, very high-caliber talent. And we've been able to keep our pipeline at an elevated level. Good growth in CNI and now growth returning in Cree. So we are benefiting to a degree, yes, from the consolidation and our outlook with CNI. There are no further questions at this time. I will now turn the call over to Denis Sheahan for closing remarks. Thank you for joining us. We look forward to speaking with you following our next quarterly earnings.