Earnings Labs

Huntington Bancshares Incorporated (HBAN)

Q4 2014 Earnings Call· Thu, Jan 22, 2015

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good morning. My name is Anastasia and I will be your conference operator today. At this time I would like to welcome everyone to the Huntington Bancshares’ Fourth Quarter Earnings Conference Call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speakers’ remarks, there will be a question-and-answer session. [Operator Instructions]. Thank you. Todd Beekman, Director of Investor Relations, you may begin your conference.

Todd Beekman

Analyst

Thank you, Anastasia and welcome. I’m Todd Beekman the Managing Director of Strategy and Investor Relations for Huntington. Copies of the slides that we will be reviewing can be found on our website at huntington.com. This call is being recorded and will be available as a rebroadcast starting about an hour after the close of the call. Slides two and three have several aspects, basis of today’s presentation. I encourage you to read these, but let me point out one key disclosure. This presentation will reference non-GAAP financial measures. And in that regard, I direct you to comparable GAAP financial measures and a reconciliation to comparable GAAP financial measures within the presentation, initial earnings-related material we released this morning and related 8-K filed today, all of which can be found on our website. Turning to slide four, today’s discussion, including the Q&A period, will contain forward-looking statements. Such statements are based on information and assumptions available at this time and are subject to changes, risks and uncertainties, which may cause actual results to differ materially. We assume no obligation to update such statements. For a complete discussion of risks and uncertainties, please refer to this slide, material filed with the SEC including our most recent 10-K, 10-Q and 8-K filings. As noted on slide five, presenters today are Steve Steinour, Chairman, President and CEO and Mac McCullough, Chief Financial Officer. Dan Neumeyer, Chief Credit Officer will also participate in Q&A portion of the call. Let’s get started by turning to slide six. Steve?

Steve Steinour

Analyst

Thanks Todd. I’d like to thank everyone on the call for joining us today. At Huntington, we enjoy a unique and advantaged position in the industry and we believe our future is bright. We’re focused on executing our strategic plan and we’re very pleased with results we are achieving. For the past several years, we’ve invested in the company at a time when most of the industry’s been pulling back. We’ve expanded and optimized our distribution, both physical and digital. We’ve invested in small business and commercial specialty lending verticals. We’ve added new products such as our consumer and commercial credit cards and our new business in consumer checking accounts. And each represents just a handful of the investments we’ve made. Our 2014 earnings reflected results from these investments, yet significant opportunity remains as none of these investments are mature. We have a strong outlook for the future. Slides six and seven show some of the financial highlights of the full year and the fourth quarter. Mac will go through more of the detail shortly, but I wanted to highlight a few of these items that I believe distinguish Huntington and illustrate our strategic execution. Huntington had a solid year in 2014, reporting net income of $632 million or $0.72 per common share while absorbing $0.06 per share of significant items. Return on assets for the year was 1.01% and the return on common tangible equity was 11.8%. Underlying fundamental trends were somewhat obscured by a net $75 million of significant items over the two years specifically. In 2014, results were negatively impacted by a net $65 million of significant items, while 2013 results benefited from a net $10 million of significant items. So, these significant items were largely related to two acquisitions and other strategic decisions that we believe…

Mac McCullough

Analyst

Thanks Steve and good morning everyone. Slide nine is a summary of our quarterly trends and key performance metrics. Steve already touched on several of these, so let’s move on to slide 10 and drill into the underlying details. Relative to last year’s fourth quarter, total revenue increased $25 million or 4% to $714 million. Spread revenue accounted for the entire increase as net interest income grew 10%. Driving net interest income growth was a $7 billion or 13% increase in average earning assets. Loans made up $4 billion of the increase with the remainder of the growth in the securities portfolio including $1.3 billion of direct purchase municipal instruments originated by our commercial lending teams. The net interest margin declined 10 basis points year-over-year to 3.18% in the fourth quarter of 2014. This decrease reflected a 17 basis-point contraction in earning asset yields including 4 basis points related to the increase in the size of the securities portfolio as we prepare for the upcoming Basel III liquidity coverage ratio requirement and a 3 basis-point decline in the benefit from the non-interest bearing funds. These reductions were partially offset by 10 basis points of improvement in funding costs. On a linked quarter basis, the net interest margin compressed 2 basis points exclusively related to declining earning asset yields. Fourth quarter fee income of $233 million which represented a $17 million or 7% decline from the year ago quarter. Lower mortgage banking income accounted for $10 million of the decline while the remainder of the decrease primarily related to lower fees associated with commercial customer activity in the other income line. Negative impacts to fee income during the fourth quarter included $6 million of net MSR hedging related activity and a full quarter’s impact of July’s changes to our consumer deposit…

Steve Steinour

Analyst

Thank you, Mac. Turning to slide 17, as I alluded to in my opening remarks, our fair play banking philosophy, coupled with our optimal customer relationship or OCR continues to drive new customer growth and improved product penetration. This slide illustrates the continued upward trend in consumer checking account households. And over the last year, consumer checking account households grew by 129,000 households or 10%. And the fourth quarter was relatively unchanged from the prior quarter due to seasonality, costumer activity and a reduction of our marketing programs made earlier in the year. If we exclude the impact of the Camco and Bank of America branch acquisitions, organic growth in consumer checking households was a healthy 6% for the year. Our strategy is not just about market share gains but also gains in share of wallet. We continue to focus on increasing the number of products and services we provide to the customers knowing that this will translate into revenue growth. Our OCR cross-sell goal of six or more products and services improved to almost 50% in our consumer account households this quarter, up more than 174 basis points from a year ago. Correspondingly, our consumer checking account household revenue for the fourth quarter is up 12% year-over-year. You can see on slide 18, commercial relationship growth has returned as we’ve worked through the impact to the changes made in our business banking checking products that impacted a number of lower balance accounts. Commercial relationships increased 3% year-over-year. Excluding the impacts of the Camco and Bank of America branch acquisitions, organic growth in commercial relationships was 2% for the year. Our former product OCR cross-sell for commercial relationships improved almost 42% this quarter, up more than 4% from a year ago. Commercial relationship revenue for the fourth quarter grew 12%…

Todd Beekman

Analyst

Operator, we’ll now take questions and ask for the courtesy of your peers, each person ask only one question and one related follow-up. And if that person has additional questions, we ask to add themselves back to the queue. Thank you. Anastasia?

Operator

Operator

[Operator Instructions]. Your first question comes from Scott Siefers with Sandler O’Neill. Your line is open.

Todd Beekman

Analyst

Good morning, Scott. Scott Siefers - Sandler O’Neill: Good morning, guys. Actually Mac, maybe first one is for you. You talked about possibility of margin pressure and gave kind of the puts and takes. So, I wonder if you can spend -- expecting just talking about order of magnitude of margin pressure. I mean the funding remix that’s an opportunity but the LCR, still bit of a headwind. You’ve been doing maybe 1 or 2 basis points of core compression a quarter for a while. Is that still something seems fair going forward?

Mac McCullough

Analyst

Well, thanks Scott, thanks for the question. I think the way to think about it, we continue to see compression in certain loan portfolios as we see the re-pricing take place. Certainly there are some portfolios where we’ve already crossed that line but we’re not seeing significant or any re-pricing. We will see some pressure as we add securities for LCR. We’ll about 1 billion incremental along with kind of having to repurchase about 100 million to 130 million a month from maturities. So, those things will add the margin pressure as well. Certainly there is not much room on the deposit side going forward. We do continue to grow demand deposits very nicely. And that is certainly going to help as we remix the deposits but continued pressure on the margin that will be outpaced by earning asset growth in 2015. Scott Siefers - Sandler O’Neill: Okay. Thank you. And maybe just separate question. So, I think we have a good sense for how you think on auto pricing, given your comments, Mac. But maybe Mac or Steve, just given the amount of attention that auto lending gets these days, if you could spend maybe another second, talking about sort of growth and credit prospects as you see from your position.

Steve Steinour

Analyst

We have been very consistent with our auto lending we show to you every quarter. If you look back over the last five years, our FICO bands are credibly tight [ph] our loan to values, new use moves a little bit depending on the year and new production by the auto manufacturers. But we’re very bullish on auto. We think we’re going to come off a very good year and have an even better one. Certainly there is consumer benefit coming by a refinance potential that exists today compounded with the lower price of the pump for gas, should help drive auto to even -- to no worse than last year. We’re optimistic it’s going to be a better year on the whole. And our discipline will remain in place and we expect our performance to continue at or better than prior periods. Scott Siefers - Sandler O’Neill: All right. That’s perfect. Thank you very much, guys.

Steve Steinour

Analyst

Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from Ken Usdin with Jefferies. Your line is open.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst · Jefferies. Your line is open.

Hey guys, this is actually Josh [ph] covering for Ken. Can you speak to what you saw in mortgage banking this quarter? We saw from other banks that this held up a little stronger and you guys saw a little more weakness.

Mac McCullough

Analyst · Jefferies. Your line is open.

What we saw on a year-over-year basis, we did have an MSR gain in the fourth quarter of 2013, we had MSR increase in the fourth quarter of 2014. So, I think that certainly impacted us quite a bit. Other than that, I think our production stats were in line with what we saw in the industry. And we certainly are seeing a pickup as we see what’s happening today in the market. So, we do expect a better improvement in this line in 2015.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst · Jefferies. Your line is open.

Okay. And then just more generally, can you speak to the revenue drivers for fee income in ‘15 where you are expecting to see the most growth or less growth?

Mac McCullough

Analyst · Jefferies. Your line is open.

We certainly have seen a few areas in the fee income area that are showing strength due to our growth in households and also businesses as Steve mentioned earlier. We see capital markets increasing; we see the ATM and debit card fees increasing significantly both double-digit growth in the quarter. We do expect to see a better growth in non-interest income in 2015 relative to what we saw in 2014 as we probably bottomed out in mortgage. And again, as we discussed earlier, we are going to see good earning asset growth that will certainly offset any progression we see in 2015.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst · Jefferies. Your line is open.

Okay, great. Thanks for the time guys.

Todd Beekman

Analyst · Jefferies. Your line is open.

Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from Mathew O’Connor with Deutsche Bank. Your line is open. Mathew O’Connor - Deutsche Bank: Good morning.

Todd Beekman

Analyst

Good morning, Matt. Mathew O’Connor - Deutsche Bank: I was wondering if you could elaborate on the two credits that drove the increase in criticized assets. I guess first what industries were they in?

Dan Neumeyer

Analyst

Hey Matt, this is Dan. Yes, one was in metals, the supplier to the auto industry and the other was in natural resources, both legacy credits, both we feel very positive about their ultimate disposition. But we’re trying to call these things early and make sure that we leave all of our options open for resolution. So, that comprise the majority of what would be considered more than normal inflow. And then we also have throughout the fourth quarter taken a very deep dive into all portfolios as we attempt to stay in front of any development front and still again calling the credits early and giving ourselves every opportunity for rehabilitation. Mathew O’Connor - Deutsche Bank: And I know there are some moving pieces because most of the credit metrics were quite good in terms of charge-offs, non-performers. But as you think about the higher criticized assets and then the loan loss reserve release this quarter, I guess I’m surprised how much reserve release there was given the increase in criticized assets.

Mac McCullough

Analyst

Yes. So, there is a lot of components as to how we look at making sure we have an adequate and appropriate ACL. And most of the metrics as you know were very strong. So, we had a really low level of charge-offs, NPAs coming down and improving economy. And so, when you factor all those in and if we see a trend developing, we’ll modify. But we don’t believe we’ve seen a trend here. We think this is one quarter phenomenon and the increase in criticized. So, we feel very good about the level of ACL today. And again, we continue to have improvements in the C&I portfolio, continued recoveries in CRE which drove a lot of the reduction. So, on the whole we think we’re right where we need to be. Mathew O’Connor - Deutsche Bank: And as we think about the reserve levels going forward, we think of them being closer to charge-offs or you start building a little bit or…?

Mac McCullough

Analyst

Well clearly, we don’t expect -- we’re at our -- lower than where we expect to be on charge-offs, so I certainly don’t see things getting better on that front from here. So, I think you can make you own assessment of that. Mathew O’Connor - Deutsche Bank: Okay. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from Bob Ramsey with FBR. Your line is open

Todd Beekman

Analyst · FBR. Your line is open

Hey Bob.

Bob Ramsey - FBR

Analyst · FBR. Your line is open

Hey, good morning guys. I was hoping you could just touch on the sort of some of the through the cycle long-term goals. You talked about specifically your new return on tangible common equity goal and the efficiency number. Are those numbers that you hope to be able to touch at some point in 2015 or are these numbers that you really need higher rates or some other catalysts or bring you into that zone?

Mac McCullough

Analyst · FBR. Your line is open

Yes. Thanks Bob, it’s Mac. So, you certainly touched on one variable that is going to impact how soon we achieve the bottom end of some of these ranges and that is the rate environment. But clearly we’re doing other things to make sure that we move in that direction. We’ve talked about positive operating leverage; we’ve talked about making sure that we manage our expense base as it relates to the revenue opportunity that we have in any one year. And that certainly is going to continue to move us towards the efficiency ratio target. As it relates to tangible common equity, we are continuing to make the right investments in the businesses that we think have the best returns going forward. We are looking through opportunities to optimize the existing balance sheet and in some cases making sure that we are being efficient in how we’re using our balance sheet and certainly investing in higher return on equity businesses. So, this is going to be -- it’s not going to happen overnight but certainly the things that we do every day, they head in the right direction are going to help us get there. And I would expect late 2015, 2016, we’ll start to see the achievement of some of these ratios.

Bob Ramsey - FBR

Analyst · FBR. Your line is open

And will you see them in late 2015 or 2016 even if rates don’t move up as sort of as expected or do you really need that rate move? I know it is helpful but is it absolutely necessary I guess?

Mac McCullough

Analyst · FBR. Your line is open

Yes. What I’ll commit to is we’re going to continue to make progress in the right direction and that rates will certainly help us get there but there are a lot of other things that we’re doing that are going to help us achieve those ratios.

Bob Ramsey - FBR

Analyst · FBR. Your line is open

Okay. And then I guess similarly as you’ll talk about your revenue growth expectations and any outlook for this year, does it move materially if there is -- if you do get a 50 basis-point move in rates in the back half of 2015, does it materially move the revenue numbers for 2015 or is it more of an impact the year after?

Mac McCullough

Analyst · FBR. Your line is open

Well clearly, it would be a larger impact for the year after, given any rate change later in the year really going to partial your benefit. Clearly, we’ll get some pickup as rates increase. And certainly midyear or later seems to be what would be the best we can hope for. But the bigger impact would come in 2016.

Bob Ramsey - FBR

Analyst · FBR. Your line is open

Okay, all right. Thank you guys.

Todd Beekman

Analyst · FBR. Your line is open

Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from Jon Arfstrom with RBC Capital Markets. Your line is open.

Jon Arfstrom - RBC Capital Markets

Analyst · RBC Capital Markets. Your line is open.

Hey, thanks. Good morning guys.

Todd Beekman

Analyst · RBC Capital Markets. Your line is open.

Good morning, Jon.

Jon Arfstrom - RBC Capital Markets

Analyst · RBC Capital Markets. Your line is open.

Just clarification, maybe for Dan or Mac on the provision. Are you saying you expect the provision to come back in line with charge-offs against during 2015?

Dan Neumeyer

Analyst · RBC Capital Markets. Your line is open.

Actually we didn’t say that. We are at a low point in terms of charge-offs. So, provision was lower this quarter than we have seen. Much of it’s going to depend on loan growth and the state of the economy. But I would say it’s probably likely the provision is not going to remain at this level or lower on a go forward basis.

Mac McCullough

Analyst · RBC Capital Markets. Your line is open.

Yes. Jon, it’s Mac. Obviously the provision is the outcome of how we think about we need from an appropriate reserve perspective and we just have a lot of very positive actions in the fourth quarter that in this provision number. I think the inflow of classified that we saw that’s criticized that is obviously incorporated into the fourth quarter number. And we do feel comfortable with credit quality where it’s out there. So, clearly we’re at a low level relative to what we expect longer term. There could be some volatility as we move forward because we are at such a low level but I think a lot of things came together in the right direction this quarter to make that happen.

Jon Arfstrom - RBC Capital Markets

Analyst · RBC Capital Markets. Your line is open.

Okay, good. Just another clarification point on the operating leverage number. Are you assuming $1.8 billion expense base in terms of expense growth before we go to the expense number?

Mac McCullough

Analyst · RBC Capital Markets. Your line is open.

That’s correct.

Jon Arfstrom - RBC Capital Markets

Analyst · RBC Capital Markets. Your line is open.

Okay. And then just one more if I can Steve, you talked a little bit about energy prices. You do have some Marcellus and Utica overlap; on the other hand you have a big consumer base. How do you think about the puts and takes of low energy prices?

Steve Steinour

Analyst · RBC Capital Markets. Your line is open.

I think it’s tremendous for our region, both at the consumer but I’d also say at a commercial level our businesses whether they are manufacturers, distributor services, they are going to benefit from lower energy costs, price of the pump whatever. Our energy exposure is very modest; it’s part of strategy purposeful selection and a particularly slice in that market and if you will a go slow approach to make sure we are fully absorbing what we were -- and understanding what as we thought a little portfolio.

Jon Arfstrom - RBC Capital Markets

Analyst · RBC Capital Markets. Your line is open.

Okay, all right. Thank you.

Steve Steinour

Analyst · RBC Capital Markets. Your line is open.

Thank you.

Todd Beekman

Analyst · RBC Capital Markets. Your line is open.

Thanks Jon.

Operator

Operator

[Operator Instructions]. Your next question comes from Geoffrey Elliott with Autonomous Research. Your line is open.

Geoffrey Elliott - Autonomous Research

Analyst · Autonomous Research. Your line is open.

Hi. It’s Geoff Elliot from Autonomous. On the natural resources, you mentioned that one of the new criticized loans was in that sector. So, could you just give us a bit more of detail on what the total exposure to that sector looks like and kind of how it breaks down between oil and gas, mining other kind of components of natural resources?

Mac McCullough

Analyst · Autonomous Research. Your line is open.

Okay. Let’s say that’s a pretty broad category. When we talk about what we have; natural resources is the broadest of categories. Our E&P book which is how has been our energy vertical that has about 500 million of commitment and about 300 million or so in outstanding. And that is largely reserve base, syndicated deals that have broad geographic diversity. The entire energy category can define at a number of different ways but I think in terms of the oil and gas has primarily reserve based lending and…

Geoffrey Elliott - Autonomous Research

Analyst · Autonomous Research. Your line is open.

About oil versus gas and…

Mac McCullough

Analyst · Autonomous Research. Your line is open.

Sure. And our energy book is weighted towards natural gas. We do have about half dozen of ores that are oil heavy but the majority of the book is weighted towards natural gas. And again, reserve base, for the most part we do have a few midstream names in there as well. And I should emphasize that in that portfolio none of that was in the -- moved to criticized.

Geoffrey Elliott - Autonomous Research

Analyst · Autonomous Research. Your line is open.

Okay. So, in [indiscernible] natural resources?

Mac McCullough

Analyst · Autonomous Research. Your line is open.

Correct.

Geoffrey Elliott - Autonomous Research

Analyst · Autonomous Research. Your line is open.

Great, thank you very much.

Todd Beekman

Analyst · Autonomous Research. Your line is open.

Thank you, Geoff.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from Erika Najarian with Bank of America. Your line is open.

Todd Beekman

Analyst · Bank of America. Your line is open.

Good morning, Erika.

Erika Najarian - Bank of America

Analyst · Bank of America. Your line is open.

Hi, everybody. I just had one follow-up question; I just wanted to make sure that I got the message clearly. And I think you are giving us so much detail for ‘15. The message that I’m getting is regardless of the rate backdrop in the short end or long end, Huntington will grow revenues in ‘15 and post positive operating leverage.

Mac McCullough

Analyst · Bank of America. Your line is open.

Right Erika, it’s Mac. So, we are going to manage the expense base based on a revenue environment to achieve positive operating leverage. So, we do continue to see good earning asset growth which we believe will overcome any NIM pressure that we have in 2015. And we are going to see better growth in fee income in 2015 as well. So, yes, I think the positive operating leverage comment is a strong comment that we are committed to.

Erika Najarian - Bank of America

Analyst · Bank of America. Your line is open.

Got it. Thank you.

Todd Beekman

Analyst · Bank of America. Your line is open.

Thanks Erika.

Operator

Operator

There are no further questions at this time. I turn the call back over to the presenters.

Steve Steinour

Analyst

So, in summary, we’re pleased with our performance for the full year 2014 and especially the fourth quarter. Results reflected the disciplined execution of our strategies and the strong competitive position of Huntington and our brand highlighted by superior customer service which is separating us from our peers. We continue to gain market share and improved share of wallet. We’ve produced 4% annual revenue growth and positive operating leverage in a challenging. We also took demonstrable steps to improve efficiency and optimize the franchise. And finally, our board and this management team, we are all long-term shareholders; we remain focused on actively managing risk, reducing volatility while investing for top line growth achieving positive operating leverage. We’re here to drive long-term performance. So thank you for your interest in Huntington and have a great day.

Operator

Operator

This concludes today’s conference call. You may now disconnect.