Steven Roth
Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer at Vornado Realty Trust
Thank you, Steve, and good morning to everyone. Let me get a few things out of the way first. Our business is performing well in this environment. Our outlook hasn't changed since last quarter. We are full-speed ahead on our current projects, totaling over 5 million square feet in the PENN District. Any comment in the newspapers or industry tabloids that we have stopped is incorrect and just plain silly. Just take a look at our three-block long construction site, when you next go through PENN Station or next go to a Knicks playoff game.
Now, some commentary on last week's dividend press release and reactions there, too. Simply stated, we are going on offense. Let me say that again, we are going on offense. A few facts for context. You know about dividends. In 2022, our dividend was $2.12 or $435 million in cash. Over the past 10 years, we have paid and happily paid $5.1 billion in regular dividends and another $400 million special dividends. Last week, an analyst characterized weak dividends as sacred, and I agree. Well, I guess I sort of agree. For this year, we have already paid a $0.375 or $75 million cash first-quarter dividend. We will pause paying dividends in the second and third quarters. And in the fourth quarter, based upon known facts, actual taxable income, including asset sales, etc., we will pay out, as we must, taxable income, but we'll reassess whether it is wise as appropriate to pay in cash or in a combination of cash and scrip. Shareholders should be indifferent as to whether they receive cash or scrip, but that cash if retained by the cooperation might be more wisely employed for debt management, stock buybacks or whatever.
As most of you know. I have resisted buybacks for years and years, resisting copycatting sister-industry companies and resisting the pounding from analysts to quote, "Close the NAV gap." I believe my resistance was logical and fact-based. But since last quarter's dividend announcement to this quarter's dividend announcement, our stock price has declined 35% from a low-level to an even lower level. Seeing value in the stock and an opportunity to create shareholder value, last Wednesday included in our dividend press release, our Board authorized a $200 million share buyback program. We will proceed carefully and in a measured way, funding the buyback from asset sales or even cash retained from paying the dividend in scrip.
Since our dividend is sized based on taxable income, not FFO earnings, here is the math. 2021 taxable income was $2.03 versus a $2.12 dividend. 2022 taxable income was $2.08 versus $2.12 dividend. 2023 taxable income is currently projected at $1.05 without any asset sales, and surely there will be asset sales. The difference between 2022 and 2023 taxable income is primarily increased interest rates.
A couple of other comments. We think we have seen the peak in work from home, more and more CEOs are now requiring their please back to the office. With each passing week, the office buildings show more like 2019, and we believe it's just a matter of time before everyone is back for good. New York City seems to be leading the country in this regard.
Lastly, with all CBD office stocks having been crushed, and great concern about the future viability of office, it is important to review our financial position and our liquidity. We [Technical Issues] $2.2 billion of liquidity, including $1.3 billion of cash and treasury bills. We have over $8 billion at today's markdown values of debt-free, unencumbered assets. PENN 1, PENN 2 and Farley are all unencumbered. The remaining capital program to complete PENN 2 has been pre-funded and will be paid for out of cash balances. These buildings have significant future embedded earnings growth and as PENN 2 rents up, that incremental income will do wonders for our debt metrics.
We have relied primarily on project-level non-recourse debt, old-fashioned mortgages. Only 2.5 of our debt is recourse, and that's with well-laddered maturities. We are clear-eyed and realistic about the near-term financial market challenges. It is not pretty when 3% rolls over into 6%, 7% or even an 8% market. We will certainly have a few workouts to deal, but over the next couple of -- a few workouts to deal with over the next couple of years, but that is the point of having non-recourse debt. We have no maturities this year, limited property-level maturities next year, and no corporate maturities until 2025, with sufficient capacity on our line that matures in December '27, so that we don't have to breach the asset finance at current -- in the current hospital market.
Thank you, and now over to Michael to cover the financials and the market.
