Financial Institutions Q2 2024 Earnings Report

Financial Institutions EPS Results

• Actual EPS: $1.62
• Consensus EPS: $0.70
• Beat/Miss: Beat by +$0.92
• One Year Ago EPS: $0.91

Financial Institutions Revenue Results

• Actual Revenue: $102.80 million
• Expected Revenue: N/A
• Beat/Miss: N/A
• YoY Revenue Growth: N/A

Financial Institutions Announcement Details

• Quarter: Q2 2024
• Date: 7/25/2024
• Time: After Market Closes
• Conference Call Date: Friday, July 26, 2024
• Conference Call Time: 8:30AM ET

Financial Institutions (NASDAQ:FISI) (NASDAQ: FISI) is a non-diversified, closed-end management investment company that seeks to provide tax-advantaged income to shareholders. The company invests primarily in investment-grade municipal obligations issued by states, municipalities and government agencies across the United States. By focusing on high-credit-quality bonds, Financial Institutions aims to deliver current income that is exempt from federal income tax.

In constructing its portfolio, the company may also utilize money market instruments and repurchase agreements to manage liquidity and facilitate efficient settlement. Its investment strategy emphasizes thorough credit analysis and sector diversification, with allocations that can include general obligation bonds, revenue bonds pledged against specific projects and securities issued for public infrastructure development. This disciplined approach is designed to balance yield objectives with capital preservation.

Financial Institutions, Inc. is listed on the Nasdaq under the ticker FISI and maintains regular disclosure of its portfolio holdings and performance metrics. The company’s governance structure includes an independent board of directors and an experienced investment adviser, ensuring that portfolio decisions and risk management practices align with the interests of its shareholders.

Financial Institutions Q2 2024 Earnings Call Transcript

Key Takeaways

• In Q2 2024, the company delivered record GAAP net income of $25.3 M, or $1.62 per diluted share, up sharply from Q1’s $1.7 M.
• The sale of the SDN Insurance Agency generated a $13.5 M pre‐tax gain, eliminated $11.3 M in goodwill and intangibles, and boosted the common equity Tier 1 ratio by 60 bps to over 10 %.
• Net interest margin expanded to 2.87 % (FTE), up 9 bps from Q1, as the bank reinvested cash flows into higher‐yielding originations, driving net interest income to $41.2 M.
• Asset quality remained robust with zero net charge‐offs on commercial loans and a drop in indirect net charge-offs from 128 bps in Q1 to 38 bps in Q2.
• Management continues to pursue legal actions related to the March deposit fraud event, recording full exposure in Q1, a $143 K recovery in Q2, and ongoing cooperation with law enforcement.

Presentation

[Operator]

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Financial Institutions, Inc second quarter 2024 earnings call. All lines have been placed on mute during the presentation portion of the call, with an opportunity for question and answer at the end. If you would like to ask a question, please press star, followed by one on your telephone keypad. I would now like to hand the conference call over to your host, Kate Croft, Director of Investor Relations. Please go ahead when you are ready.

[Kate Croft, Director of Investor Relations at Financial Institutions]

Thank you for joining us for today's call. Providing prepared comments will be President and CEO, Marty Birmingham, and CFO, Jack Plants. They will be joined by additional members of the company's leadership team during the question-and-answer session. Today's prepared comments and Q&A will include forward-looking statements. Actual results may differ materially from forward-looking statements due to a variety of risks, uncertainties, and other factors. We refer you to yesterday's earnings release and investor presentation, as well as historical SEC filings, which are available on our Investor Relations website for a safe harbor description and a detailed discussion of the risk factors relating to forward-looking statements. We'll also discuss certain non-GAAP financial measures intended to supplement and not substitute for comparable GAAP measures.

[Kate Croft, Director of Investor Relations at Financial Institutions]

Reconciliations of these measures to GAAP financial measures were provided in the earnings release filed as an exhibit to Form 8-K or in our latest investor presentation available on our IR website, www.fisi-investors.com. Please note that this call includes information that may only be accurate as of today's date, July 26, 2024. I'll now turn the call over to President and CEO Marty Birmingham.

[Marty Birmingham, President and CEO at Financial Institutions]

Thank you, Kate. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. Our strong earnings performance in the second quarter of 2024 reflects both the successful divestiture of our insurance subsidiary and the strength of our core business amid a continued challenging operating environment. Record quarterly net income was accompanied by net interest margin expansion, improvement of our already strong asset quality metrics, and meaningful build in our regulatory and tangible capital ratio. That these record results come on the heels of the most challenging quarter we have ever experienced is not lost on me. If anything, our second quarter financial and operating performance is a testament to the strength and resolve of our team to stay focused on serving our customers and communities and on strong execution on our strategic priorities.

[Marty Birmingham, President and CEO at Financial Institutions]

Since the deposit-related fraud event we discovered and disclosed in early March, we have worked tirelessly to thoroughly review and understand all the facts and identify every opportunity to prevent future recurrence, including engaging a third-party expert to support our review and advise on best practices for fraud prevention and detection and implementing enhanced training. As we recorded the full exposure of this event in the first quarter, we have continued to aggressively pursue our legal rights and are actively seeking any and all recovery avenues. In the second quarter, this led us to add three individuals as defendants in our civil case based on a forensic analysis of transaction activity. We are also pleased that our request for a receiver to oversee the defendant's multiple businesses was granted swiftly by the court. In the second quarter, we also recorded a small recovery of $143,000.

[Marty Birmingham, President and CEO at Financial Institutions]

While we cannot comment on the likelihood or timing of any criminal action, we have fully cooperated with law enforcement and promptly responded to all requests for information. We've been proactive and engaged with our executive team, board, regulators, and law enforcement, and will continue to do so. We strive to bring the same transparency to our shareholders as we navigate the legal process. We expect to provide updates to our quarterly earnings disclosures and on our 10-Qs moving forward in the aftermath of this fraud event as appropriate, both in terms of what is meaningful to our results and expectations and what we are able to share given the ongoing litigation and law enforcement investigation. Our team's ability to vigorously manage this event while completing a successful and accretive transaction and driving very solid core operating results is something I'm incredibly proud of.

[Marty Birmingham, President and CEO at Financial Institutions]

Record GAAP net income available to common shareholders was $25.3 million, or $1.62 per diluted share in the second quarter compared to $1.7 million, or $0.11 per diluted share in the linked first quarter. Year to date, we reported a return on average assets of 90 basis points and an efficiency ratio of 75%. Setting aside expenses related to the March 2024 fraud event that were incurred during the first and second quarters of the year, as well as the second quarter gain associated with the SDN sale, our core business performed very well. Excluding the aforementioned items, normalized year to date ROAA was 1.07%, while our efficiency ratio was 66%. Diluted EPS on an adjusted basis was $1.12 and $0.96 in the first and second quarters of 2024, respectively. You'll find a non-GAAP reconciliation on these select and other metrics published in our second quarter 2024 investor presentation.

[Marty Birmingham, President and CEO at Financial Institutions]

Turning back to our reported GAAP results, certainly the most significant driver of improvements from prior periods was the sale of our insurance subsidiary, SDN Insurance Agency, to NFP Property and Casualty Services. This strategic transaction, which we announced and closed on April 1st, capitalized on both strong valuations of insurance businesses in the market and what we believe was peak EBITDA margins for SDN. The sale generated a pre-tax gain of $13.5 million and eliminated $11.3 million of goodwill and other intangibles. As a result, we saw meaningful growth in our capital ratios, including a 60 basis point increase in our Common Equity Tier 1 ratio and a 69 basis point increase in our TCE ratio from March 31, 2024. I'm proud of our strong execution on this transaction and pleased with our ability to source capital in an accretive manner. Our core business is also performing well.

[Marty Birmingham, President and CEO at Financial Institutions]

Total loans were up modestly during the quarter, as commercial growth was offset by anticipated and intentional runoff in our indirect portfolio, while total deposits were down 4.9%, reflecting seasonality of our public deposit portfolio. Jack will dive deeper into year-to-date cash flows, the type of yield we are seeing, and our expectations through the second half of the year, but I'd first like to comment on the continued strength of our asset quality. 63% of total loans are commercial loans, which grew $47.2 million, or 1.7%, during the second quarter. Our commercial franchise is well diversified by client type and geography, with loan production offices in suburban Maryland and Syracuse, New York, complementing our legacy Western New York and Central New York markets. Our lenders have both deep experience and relationships in our footprint, and their expertise contributes to the strong and stable credit quality metrics we've seen in our portfolio.

[Marty Birmingham, President and CEO at Financial Institutions]

We reported zero annualized net charge-offs to average loans for the commercial portfolio in the second quarter of 2024, following a similar result in the first quarter. Commercial non-performing loans totaled $16.1 million at June 30, 2024, compared to $16.8 million at March 31. The majority of this continues to relate to the single commercial relationship that we placed on non-accrual in the fourth quarter of 2023. We have seen softer commercial loan growth this year as general economic conditions remain unfavorable. Interest rate friction remains in place, favoring the use of excess cash over higher-rate borrowings for operating needs and commercial real estate. Our team continues to focus on rebuilding pipelines and paying close attention to our customers to ensure we meet their loan and deposit needs while monitoring credit performance.

[Marty Birmingham, President and CEO at Financial Institutions]

We continue to work with capable commercial operators and high-quality CRE sponsors without compromising our commitment to credit-disciplined loan growth. On the consumer side, residential loans were relatively flat on a linked quarter basis at $723.2 million, given the tight housing inventory and competitive landscape in our Upstate New York markets. The credit quality of this asset class has been solid and consistent for us, and net charge-offs have remained relatively benign. Our indirect portfolio totaled $894.6 million at June 30, 2024, down $25.8 million, or 2.8%, from March 31. We saw meaningful improvement in the indirect net charge-off ratio between periods, from 128 basis points in the first quarter to 38 basis points in the second, and Jack will provide more detail on indirect charge-offs and delinquencies and how they flow through our provision in just a moment.

[Marty Birmingham, President and CEO at Financial Institutions]

Overall, we remain very confident in the health of our loan portfolio and associated asset quality metrics and are pleased with the linked quarter improvement we experienced. I'd now like to turn the call over to Jack for additional details on financial results and 2024 guidance.

[Jack Plants, CFO at Financial Institutions]

Thank you, Marty. Good morning, everyone. At the start of the year, we guided to low single-digit loan growth and indicated that we believed we had reached a bottom on margin. That held true as we achieved net interest margin stability in the first quarter and a lift in the second. We reported NIM on a fully taxable equivalent basis, 287 basis points for the second quarter of 2024, up 9 basis points from 278 in the linked first quarter. Interest-earning asset yields increased 7 basis points, while the overall cost of funds declined 2 basis points. Net interest income of $41.2 million for the second quarter was up $1.1 million from the first quarter of 2024. Margin expansion and net interest income growth have come as we've been able to reinvest cash flows into higher-yielding originations.

[Jack Plants, CFO at Financial Institutions]

Year-to-date actual cash flow from the loan portfolio was about $428 million, while originations were $448 million. This is a bit lighter than what we've modeled for the first half of the year, but not significantly. Through the first half of the year, loan originations have come on with net yields above 8%, replacing loans rolling off at an average yield of about 6.65%. Furthermore, cash flow from our investment securities portfolio continues to provide opportunities to improve overall yield on the balance sheet. Looking out over the second half of the year, we're budgeting about $550 million in total cash flow from our loan and securities portfolios, providing ample opportunity to drive margin expansion. For the next 12 months, we continue to expect more than $1 billion in total cash flow.

[Jack Plants, CFO at Financial Institutions]

As Marty mentioned, the linked quarter decline in deposits was largely due to seasonal outflows in our public or municipal portfolio, along with a reduction in brokered CDs. While we continue to experience disintermediation into higher-cost time deposits in the ongoing high-rate environment, we were able to reduce short-term borrowings and brokered deposits late in the first quarter, which brought our overall cost of funds down between periods. In looking at our total deposit portfolio relative to the magnitude of FOMC rate increases that occurred in 2022 and 2023, we have experienced a cycle-to-date beta of 48%. Excluding the cost of time deposits, the non-maturity deposit portfolio had a beta of 29%. Given FOMC expectations and internal modeling, we expect a trajectory of cost of funds that continues to flow throughout 2024.

[Jack Plants, CFO at Financial Institutions]

Non-interest income totaled $24 million in the first quarter, up $13.1 million on a linked-quarter basis, as we reported a $13.5 million gain on sale in the current quarter related to our insurance subsidiary transaction. Excluding this gain, non-interest income of $10.5 million was down only $407,000 quarter-over-quarter, as increases in several areas partially offset the decline in insurance revenue. The results for the second quarter include all operations of the insurance agency, which was sold on April 1. We placed a historic tax credit investment with a New York State refundable component into service in the second quarter that resulted in a $406,000 net gain compared to a net loss of $375,000 in the linked first quarter. With the large majority of committed projects in service, we expect it will be several quarters before we have capacity for meaningful investments in additional tax credits.

[Jack Plants, CFO at Financial Institutions]

Income from limited partnerships increased $461,000, driven by the favorable performance of underlying investments, and swap fees more than doubled from the linked quarter, up $203,000 due to increased back-to-back swap activity in the second quarter. Revenue from Courier Capital, our wealth management firm with $3 billion in assets under management, along with our branch-delivered retail wealth offering, totaled a combined $2.8 million in the second quarter, up $197,000 or 7.6% in the first quarter. Positive trends in the overall market were the primary driver of this growth. Non-interest expense was $33 million in the second quarter of 2024, compared to $54 million in the linked period. Excluding fraud event-related expenses from both periods, non-interest expense declined $2.2 million or 6.2%.

[Jack Plants, CFO at Financial Institutions]

This was primarily due to lower salaries and employee benefits expenses as a result of our April 1 insurance subsidiary sale, lower occupancy and equipment costs due to seasonality in our markets relative to snowplowing charges, and lower professional services expenses. We reported a provision for credit losses of $2 million in the second quarter of 2024, compared to a benefit of $5.5 million in the first quarter. As a reminder, indirect delinquencies impact the qualitative factor of our model and are purely quantitative in nature, corresponding to a range of delinquencies in the portfolio over the look-back period since 2006. You'll recall we saw a considerable reduction in indirect delinquencies between year-end 2023 and March 31, 2024, which drove improvement in the qualitative factor and contributed to the first quarter 2024 reserve release.

[Jack Plants, CFO at Financial Institutions]

As delinquencies are a leading indicator of charge-offs, we saw a notable reduction in indirect net charge-offs in the second quarter of 2024 at just $844,000, or an annualized 38 basis points of average loans in this portfolio. While indirect delinquencies ticked up a bit in the second quarter, contributing to our reserve build in the recent period, they remained 38% less than where they were at year-end. We continue to expect overall charge-offs to fall within our guided annual range. Income tax expense was $4.5 million in the quarter, representing an effective tax rate of 15%. Our accumulated other comprehensive loss was $125.8 million at June 30, 2024, a decrease of about $490,000 from March 31. We reported a TCE ratio at June 30 of 6.41%, and tangible common book value per share of $25.17.

[Jack Plants, CFO at Financial Institutions]

Excluding the AOCI impact, the TCE ratio and tangible common book value per share would have been at 8.27% and $32.44, respectively. We continue to expect these metrics to return to more normalized levels over time, given the high credit quality and cash-flowing nature of our investment portfolio. I will now provide an update on our guidance for the second half of 2024. We now expect the 2024 effective tax rate to fall within a range of 11%-13%, including the impact of the fraud event in the first quarter, the SDN sale in the second quarter, and the additional tax credit investments placed in service in the current quarter and recent years.

[Jack Plants, CFO at Financial Institutions]

The non-interest income and expense guidance we shared on our April investor call to reflect the sale of SDN remains unchanged, including recurring quarterly non-interest income of $8.5-$9 million and non-interest expense of $33-$34 million per quarter. This guidance excludes income related to investment tax credits, limited partnerships, and gains or losses on investment securities and assets, including from the SDN sale. At this time, we are also maintaining our previous guidance on loan and deposit growth of between 1%-3%, net interest margin of between 285-295 basis points, and full-year net charge-offs within our annualized historical range of 30-40 basis points. That concludes my prepared remarks and updated guidance. I'll now turn the call back to Marty.

[Marty Birmingham, President and CEO at Financial Institutions]

Thank you, Jack. Our continued focus on liquidity, capital, and earnings led to strong second quarter 2024 outcomes, including a Common Equity Tier 1 ratio surpassing 10%, up 60 basis points from March 31, 2024, and up 93 basis points from June 30, 2023, and meaningful growth in tangible common book value per share of 9% and 16% from the end of the linked and year-ago quarters, respectively. The stronger capital position we are in today will allow us to better capitalize on future opportunities. Substantive improvement in capital has followed meaningful progress bolstering liquidity in the last 18 months, and we look forward to building on the positive momentum of our core business to deliver sustained incremental improvement in operating performance in the quarters ahead. That concludes our prepared remarks. Operator, please open the call for questions.

[Operator]

Thank you. If you would like to register a question, please press star followed by one on your telephone keypad, ensuring you are unmuted locally. If at any time you wish to withdraw your question, you can do so by pressing star followed by two. Our first question comes from the line of Damon DelMonte of KBW. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.

[Damon DelMonte, Managing Director at KBW]

Hey, good morning, everyone. Hope you're all doing well, and thanks for taking my questions. So first question I had was just on the margin. Jack, you know I was hoping you could just kind of give us a refreshed look on your expected response to the margin should we start to see some cuts by the Fed, you know at least one here in the back half of the year and just a little bit longer out as we look into 2025 if there starts to be more cuts, just kind of how the margin's positioned?

[Jack Plants, CFO at Financial Institutions]

Sure, Damon. So thanks for the question. We're fairly neutral to the first couple of cuts from the Fed, but as we look out on a longer-term basis, we have a pretty short duration on our CD portfolio and on our public and reciprocal portfolios, which are sizable. Those would be the first to see some downward shifts. So I think that if the Fed's more aggressive in 2025, then it does provide some benefit to margin, but the first couple of cuts will be fairly neutral.

[Damon DelMonte, Managing Director at KBW]

Got it. Okay. Thank you. Your guidance does not include any cuts by the Fed, correct?

[Jack Plants, CFO at Financial Institutions]

That's correct.

[Damon DelMonte, Managing Director at KBW]

All right. Great. And then with respect to the loan growth, I appreciate the color there, 1%-3%, you know kind of being driven by commercial. You know is the commercial growth going to be kind of split between C&I and CRE, or are you feeling a little bit more confident about one area over the other?

[Marty Birmingham, President and CEO at Financial Institutions]

Hey, good morning. It's Marty. Actually, we're thinking about that. We're thinking about the growth in terms of both CRE and C&I. I think it's not unique to either segment. They're both thinking carefully about taking on debt, taking on pursuing projects in this higher-rate environment and kind of waiting it out and trying to use their own cash. But we are canvassing all of our commercial activities from small business C&I to CRE.

[Damon DelMonte, Managing Director at KBW]

Got it. Okay. Great. Okay. That's all that I had for now. I'll step back. Thank you.

[Jack Plants, CFO at Financial Institutions]

Thanks, Damon.

[Operator]

The next question comes from the line of Matthew Breese of Stephens. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.

[Matthew Breese, Managing Director at Stephens]

Hey, good morning. I was hoping we could touch on fee income and the fee income guide a little bit. You know I know there's some moving parts with non-operating items this quarter and then backing out some of the limited partnership stuff. I guess in short, is this quarter's run rate a decent something we should use going forward for the rest of the year?

[Jack Plants, CFO at Financial Institutions]

Yeah, it certainly is, especially since it's removed the impact of all the operations of SDN. So it's a good proxy for the next couple of quarters.

[Matthew Breese, Managing Director at Stephens]

Okay. And then I was hoping for an update on what is the percentage of pure floating-rate loans priced off Prime or SOFR on the balance sheet? And what is the blended yield on those loans versus everything else versus the fixed and adjustable-rate portfolio?

[Jack Plants, CFO at Financial Institutions]

Yeah, the floating-rate portfolio, which is SOFR Prime-based, equates to about 38% of total loans.

[Matthew Breese, Managing Director at Stephens]

Do you have a net rate on? Yeah.

[Jack Plants, CFO at Financial Institutions]

Yeah, I think it's pretty good. I would approximate it around 8%.

[Matthew Breese, Managing Director at Stephens]

Okay. Does that kind of imply that the fixed-rate portion is kind of in the low 5% range? Just curious what new commercial real estate yields and new fixed-rate yields are coming on it?

[Jack Plants, CFO at Financial Institutions]

Yeah, we actually put a slide in the investor presentation that shows the yields that are rolling off the portfolio. So that's slide 25. And you can see the roll-off yield that we've experienced in 2023 and then in the second quarter across all of our portfolios. So on the CRE side, we saw yields coming off around 7%, C&I 6.8%, then down to the resi side at 4%. The new originations that we've been experiencing in the portfolio have been coming on at around 8%.

[Matthew Breese, Managing Director at Stephens]

Got it. Okay. And then two other quick ones. One, any idea on provisioning? It's been a little bit all over the place the last handful of quarters. Just given where the reserve is and expectations for charge-offs, $5 million a quarter feels like the right place to be. And I'm just curious if that kind of syncs up with your expectations.

[Jack Plants, CFO at Financial Institutions]

Yeah, just given the credit performance in the portfolio and loan growth for the rest of the year, that's probably a little high. A lot of the provisioning fluctuation that we saw in the first quarter and second quarter was driven by delinquency trends in the indirect portfolio, which have largely stabilized versus where they were in the third and fourth quarter of last year. We did see a little bit of a pickup, but it's down significantly from where it was at year-end.

[Matthew Breese, Managing Director at Stephens]

Of the temperate growth.

[Jack Plants, CFO at Financial Institutions]

Yeah, that's with the lower level of loan growth as just driving that small cell. I'm comfortable with a 99 basis point coverage ratio to 1%. Provisioning expectations for the rest of the year will be influenced by national unemployment forecast, which is our primary loss driver, loan growth, and charge-offs.

[Matthew Breese, Managing Director at Stephens]

Okay. All right. And then the last one for me is I think you have roughly $35 million in sub-debt reaching its reset date next year. I'm just curious on any plans there, whether it's just to pay it off or do some sort of preemptive raise ahead of it.

[Jack Plants, CFO at Financial Institutions]

Yeah, we're reviewing our capital stack strategically. We have two facilities that are actually repricing next year. We're evaluating the potential to reissue that in the market or potentially replace with alternative forms of capital.

[Matthew Breese, Managing Director at Stephens]

Great. Okay. That's everything for me. I appreciate taking all my questions. Thank you.

[Jack Plants, CFO at Financial Institutions]

Thanks, Matt.

[Operator]

As a reminder, if you'd like to ask a question, please press star followed by one on your telephone keypad. As there are no additional questions waiting at this time, I'd like to hand the conference back over to Marty Birmingham for closing remarks.

[Marty Birmingham, President and CEO at Financial Institutions]

Thank you, everybody, for participating this morning. We look forward to talking to you again with our third quarter release.

[Operator]

Ladies and gentlemen, I'd like to thank you for joining today's call. Have a great rest of your day. You may now disconnect your line.

Participants

Executives

• Jack Plants, CFO
• Kate Croft, Director of Investor Relations
• Marty Birmingham, President and CEO

Analysts

• Damon DelMonte, Managing Director at KBW
• Matthew Breese, Managing Director at Stephens