OceanFirst Financial Corp. Announces 2025 Stock Repurchase Program

Rhea-AI Summary

OceanFirst Financial Corp. (NASDAQ:OCFC) has announced a new 2025 Stock Repurchase Program, authorizing the repurchase of up to 3 million shares, representing approximately 5% of its outstanding common stock. This program is additional to the company's existing 2021 Stock Repurchase Program.

Chairman and CEO Christopher D. Maher emphasized that the program reflects the company's confidence in OceanFirst shares as a compelling investment opportunity, while maintaining flexibility for organic growth, strategic initiatives, and shareholder returns.

Positive

• None.

Negative

• Potential reduction in cash reserves available for other strategic investments
• Market and economic uncertainties could impact program execution

Insights

Banking Financial Analyst

OceanFirst's new 3M share buyback program (5% of shares) enhances capital flexibility while signaling management's confidence in the company's value.

OceanFirst Financial Corp has unveiled a 2025 Stock Repurchase Program authorizing the repurchase of up to 3 million shares, representing approximately 5% of its outstanding common stock. This program is separate from their existing 2021 repurchase initiative.

This announcement signals management's confidence in the company's underlying value. When a financial institution like OceanFirst implements a buyback, it typically indicates they believe their shares are undervalued relative to the company's future prospects. By reducing the number of outstanding shares, each remaining share represents a larger ownership stake in the company, potentially enhancing earnings per share metrics.

The repurchase authorization creates a flexible capital management tool that allows OceanFirst to opportunistically return capital to shareholders while maintaining sufficient resources for organic growth initiatives and potential strategic opportunities. For a regional bank holding company, this balance between shareholder returns and maintaining growth capital is particularly important in the current banking environment.

CEO Christopher Maher's statement emphasizes this flexibility, highlighting the company's intent to maintain a dynamic capital allocation strategy that can adapt to market conditions. The authorization size – representing about 5% of outstanding shares – is meaningful without overly constraining the bank's capital position for other strategic priorities.

RED BANK, N.J., July 16, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- OceanFirst Financial Corp. (NASDAQ:“OCFC”), (the “Company”), the holding company for OceanFirst Bank N.A. (the “Bank”), today announced that its Board of Directors has authorized a 2025 Stock Repurchase Program, under which the Company may repurchase up to 3 million shares, or approximately 5% of its outstanding common stock. This authorization is incremental to the Company’s existing 2021 Stock Repurchase Program.

“The repurchase program underscores our belief that OceanFirst shares represent a compelling investment opportunity,” said Christopher D. Maher, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. “The program enhances our capital deployment flexibility, allowing us to respond opportunistically to market conditions while maintaining the capacity to invest in organic growth, strategic initiatives, and shareholder returns.”

OceanFirst Financial Corp.’s press releases are available by visiting us at www.oceanfirst.com.

Forward-Looking Statements

In addition to historical information, this news release contains certain forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, which are based on certain assumptions and describe future plans, strategies and expectations of the Company. These forward-looking statements are generally identified by use of the words “believe”, “expect”, “intend”, “anticipate”, “estimate”, “project”, “will”, “should”, “may”, “view”, “opportunity”, “potential”, or similar expressions or expressions of confidence. The Company’s ability to predict results or the actual effect of future plans or strategies is inherently uncertain. Factors which could have a material adverse effect on the operations of the Company and its subsidiaries include, but are not limited to: changes in interest rates, inflation, general economic conditions, including potential recessionary conditions, levels of unemployment in the Company’s lending area, real estate market values in the Company’s lending area, potential goodwill impairment, natural disasters, potential increases to flood insurance premiums, the current or anticipated impact of military conflict, terrorism or other geopolitical events, the imposition of tariffs or other domestic or international governmental policies, and retaliatory responses, the level of prepayments on loans and mortgage-backed securities, legislative/regulatory changes, monetary and fiscal policies of the U.S. Government, including policies of the U.S. Treasury and the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, the quality or composition of the loan or investment portfolios, demand for loan products, deposit flows, the availability of low-cost funding, changes in liquidity, including the size and composition of the Company’s deposit portfolio, and the percentage of uninsured deposits in the portfolio, changes in capital management and balance sheet strategies and the ability to successfully implement such strategies, competition, demand for financial services in the Company’s market area, changes in investor sentiment and consumer spending, borrowing and saving habits, changes in accounting principles, a failure in or breach of the Company’s operational or security systems or infrastructure, including cyberattacks, the failure to maintain current technologies, failure to retain or attract employees, the impact of pandemics on our operations and financial results and those of our customers and the Bank’s ability to successfully integrate acquired operations. These risks and uncertainties are further discussed in the Company’s Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2024, under Item 1A - Risk Factors and elsewhere, and subsequent securities filings and should be considered in evaluating forward-looking statements and undue reliance should not be placed on such statements. The Company does not undertake, and specifically disclaims any obligation, to publicly release the result of any revisions which may be made to any forward-looking statements to reflect events or circumstances after the date of such statements or to reflect the occurrence of anticipated or unanticipated events.

Company Contact:

Patrick S. Barrett
Chief Financial Officer
OceanFirst Financial Corp.
Tel: (732) 240-4500, ext. 27507
Email: pbarrett@oceanfirst.com

FAQ

What is the size of OceanFirst Financial's (NASDAQ:OCFC) 2025 stock repurchase program?

OceanFirst Financial's 2025 stock repurchase program authorizes the buyback of up to 3 million shares, representing approximately 5% of its outstanding common stock.

How does the 2025 stock repurchase program relate to OceanFirst's existing buyback program?

The 2025 stock repurchase program is incremental to OceanFirst's existing 2021 Stock Repurchase Program, providing additional buyback capacity.

What is the purpose of OceanFirst Financial's (OCFC) 2025 share repurchase program?

The program aims to provide capital deployment flexibility while maintaining capacity for organic growth, strategic initiatives, and shareholder returns, reflecting management's belief in the stock's value.

Who announced OceanFirst Financial's 2025 stock buyback program?

The program was announced by Christopher D. Maher, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of OceanFirst Financial Corp.