First Merchants Q1 2025 Earnings Report

First Merchants EPS Results

• Actual EPS: $0.94
• Consensus EPS: $0.91
• Beat/Miss: Beat by +$0.03
• One Year Ago EPS: N/A

First Merchants Revenue Results

• Actual Revenue: $160.32 million
• Expected Revenue: $171.23 million
• Beat/Miss: Missed by -$10.91 million
• YoY Revenue Growth: N/A

First Merchants Announcement Details

• Quarter: Q1 2025
• Date: 4/24/2025
• Time: Before Market Opens
• Conference Call Date: Thursday, April 24, 2025
• Conference Call Time: 11:30AM ET

First Merchants (NASDAQ:FRME) is a financial services company headquartered in Muncie, Indiana, and the parent company of First Merchants Bank. The bank provides a broad range of financial products and services to individuals, families, businesses and institutions.

Its offerings include consumer and commercial deposit accounts, residential and commercial lending, business banking, treasury management, mortgage services, investment and wealth management, and trust services. First Merchants also provides specialized financing and advisory solutions for commercial customers and other organizations.

First Merchants serves customers through banking offices and digital channels across Indiana, Ohio, Michigan and Illinois. The company traces its banking history to 1893 and has expanded its regional presence through organic growth and acquisitions.

First Merchants Q1 2025 Earnings Call Transcript

Key Takeaways

• First Quarter net income rose 15.6% year‐over‐year to $54.9M and GAAP EPS increased 17.5% to $0.94, driven by balance sheet growth, margin improvement, fee income growth, expense reductions and share repurchases.
• The Board approved a new $100M share repurchase program and has already repurchased $10M in shares while maintaining strong capital ratios (TCE 8.9%, CET1 11.5%).
• Total loans grew at a 4.8% annualized rate with commercial loans up 7% and mortgage unit volume up over 15% year‐over‐year, supported by a strong pipeline across all markets.
• Rising market volatility and potential tariff impacts introduce uncertainty for credit growth and construction lending in the back half of the year, although no specific credit issues have been identified.
• Asset quality remains solid with nonperforming loans at just 0.7% of total loans, coverage ratios of 1.47× (1.6× including fair value marks), and a pending $22M multifamily NPL sale expected with no principal loss.

Presentation

[Operator]

Thank you for standing by, and welcome to the First Merchants Corporation Q1 2025 Earnings Conference Call. Before we begin, management would like to remind you that today's call contains forward-looking statements with respect to the future performance and financial condition of First Merchants Corporation that involve risk and uncertainties. Further information is contained within the press release, which we encourage you to review. Additionally, management may refer to non-GAAP measures, which are intended to supplement but not substitute for the most directly comparable GAAP measures. The press release available on the website contains financial and other quantitative information to be discussed today, as well as a reconciliation of GAAP to non-GAAP measures. As a reminder, today's call is being recorded. I will now turn the conference over to Mr. Mark Hardwick, CEO. Mr. Hardwick, you may begin.

[Mark Hardwick, CEO at First Merchants]

Good morning and welcome to First Merchants Q1 2025 Conference Call. Thanks for the introduction and for covering the forward-looking statement on page two. We released our earnings today at approximately 8:00 A.M. Eastern Time. You can access today's slides by following the link on the third page of our earnings release. On page three of our slides, you will see today's presenters and our bios, including President Mike Stewart, Chief Credit Officer John Martin, and CFO Michele Kawiecki. Slide four has a map with all 111 banking centers, some Q1 financial highlights, and a number of the awards we've received recently. The Q1 was a strong start for the year, as we delivered 4.8% annualized loan growth and a 23 basis point increase in our return on assets.

[Mark Hardwick, CEO at First Merchants]

Q1 total assets were $18.4 billion, with $13 billion in total loans, $14.5 billion in total deposits, and $5.8 billion of assets under advisement. Q1 net income, which you can see on Slide five, was $54.9 million, an increase of $7.4 million, or 15.6% from one year ago. GAAP earnings per share increased to $0.94 from $0.80 a year ago, or a 17.5% increase due to balance sheet growth, margin improvement, fee income growth, expense reductions, and share repurchase activity. Core earnings per share grew by 10.6% from one year ago after adjusting for last year's technology integration expenses, which temporarily elevated those levels. While we are very pleased with the progress we've made, increasing earnings and profitability over last year, the volatility in the market has clearly had an impact on our share price.

[Mark Hardwick, CEO at First Merchants]

While it's frustrating, it's not something that we can directly control, but we can take advantage of it by buying back our shares. Our board recently approved a new $100 million share repurchase program, and we've already repurchased $10 million in shares. We also redeemed, through additional capital activities, another $30 million of subdebt. Our tangible common equity of 8.9% is above our target levels and provides optimal capital flexibility, given the minimal reliance that we have on hybrid equities that are always available to us if we would happen to need them. Now, Mike Stewart will discuss our line of business momentum.

[Mike Stewart, President at First Merchants]

Thank you, Mark, and good morning to all. Our business strategy summarized on slide six remains unchanged. We are a commercially focused organization across all these business segments and our primary markets of Indiana, Michigan, and Ohio. Let's turn to slide seven. I like this Slide. As Mark stated earlier, loans grew nearly $155 million, or at a 4.8% annualized rate, which follows the strong 6% loan growth we saw last quarter. The $9.8 billion commercial segment was the primary driver of the growth, increasing $169 million, or a 7% annualized growth rate. Within the Commercial segment, C&I grew by $248 million, which offset the $96 million decline in our Investment Real Estate portfolio. We saw the C&I loan growth in all of our markets as the M&A and CapEx pipelines we discussed last quarter were funded and closed.

[Mike Stewart, President at First Merchants]

Our commercial bankers continue to win new client relationships across our footprints, and revolver usage increased during the quarter due to reduction in client cash balances, which we'll talk about on the next page, and inflationary effects on inventory and receivables, which might be early impacts of tariffs. Another pleasing bullet point on this page is the quarter-ending pipeline, which is consistent from prior quarter end and gives us optimism that we will be able to maintain our loan growth. A few comments on the consumer portfolio. We have a very strong team of mortgage bankers that are driving the growth of non-interest income and the $24 million of balance sheet growth referenced on this slide. We utilize our balance sheet for variable rate, short-term, fixed rates, or construction loans.

[Mike Stewart, President at First Merchants]

On a quarter-over-prior-year quarter basis, our mortgage unit volume is up over 15%, and our dollar volume is up over 30%. As you can see on the bottom of the page, our mortgage pipeline remains strong. Let's turn to slide eight, talk about deposits. The story of this slide continues to be the mix of our product set and our goal of managing deposit costs. Michele will be reviewing our net interest margin, but this slide represents the great work our teams have done in managing and building core deposit relationships while reducing deposit costs on the public funds and maturity deposit categories in particular. For the quarter, total deposits declined 1.6% on an annualized basis. The commercial deposit balance decline is almost solely the result of the activities within the public funds portfolio, or $208 million of the $228 million total decline.

[Mike Stewart, President at First Merchants]

Public funds are an important segment, yet one of our highest-cost depository categories. What I have labeled core relationship balances declined by $20 million, which is primarily attributed to companies managing their working capital levels. We also continued our pricing discipline within our consumer segment, specifically maturity deposits. Consumer deposit balance declined during the quarter by $9 million, but core consumer relationship balances grew by $188 million, but was offset by the decline of maturity deposits of $197 million.

[Mike Stewart, President at First Merchants]

The mix of deposit core categories has been the focus of our teams for the past year. It has been a focus on primary focused accounts and deposit costs. Overall, I am pleased with the active management our teams are having with their clients to manage mix and deposit costs. Let me turn the call over to Michele to review in more detail the composition of our balance sheet and the drivers of our income statement. Michele.

[Michele Kawiecki, EVP and CFO at First Merchants]

Thanks, Mike, and good morning, everyone. Slide nine covers our Q1 performance. Looking at the summary income statement, in the middle of the page, you will see total revenues were down slightly from Q4 after normalizing for the one-time events that occurred in Q4. I would remind you that we recorded a gain on the sale of our Illinois branches, offset by a loss on securities repositioning, which resulted in a one-time $8.4 million increase non-interest income on line 13 in the Q4. Total revenues in Q1 were quite strong despite being impacted by day count and seasonality. Solid expense management during the quarter also added to the performance, with an overall result of pre-tax pre-provision earnings of $67.4 million.

[Michele Kawiecki, EVP and CFO at First Merchants]

Those earnings fueled a $0.56 increase in tangible book value over prior quarter after returning value to shareholders through dividend payments and share repurchases, bringing tangible book value per share up to $27.34, which is an increase of 9.1% when compared to the same quarter last year. Slide 10 shows details of our Investment portfolio. Expecting cash flows from scheduled principal and interest payments and bond maturities through the remainder of 2025 totaled $214 million, with a roll-off yield of approximately 2.16%. Slide 11 shows some details of our loan portfolio. The total loan portfolio yield decreased by 34 basis points to 6.21% as our variable rate portfolio repriced down due to lower short-term rates. New and renewed loans were priced with a 6.96% yield and continue to positively impact the overall portfolio yield. The allowance for credit losses is shown on Slide 12.

[Michele Kawiecki, EVP and CFO at First Merchants]

This quarter, we had net charge-offs of $4.9 million and recorded $4.2 million of provision. The reserve at quarter-end was $192 million, and the coverage ratio was 1.47%. In addition to the ACL, we have $16.3 million of remaining fair value marks on acquired loans. When including those marks, our coverage ratio is 1.6%. Overall, we remain well-reserved as our allowance is well above peer levels. Slide 13 shows details of our deposit portfolio. The total cost of deposits declined meaningfully by 20 basis points to 2.23% this quarter. Our interest-bearing deposit costs declined 25 basis points, reflecting a downward cumulative interest-bearing deposit beta, a 56%, and good deposit pricing discipline. On slide 14, net interest income on a fully tax-equivalent basis of $136.4 million decreased $3.8 million from prior quarter. Net interest margin on line six totaled 3.22% and declined 6 basis points this quarter.

[Michele Kawiecki, EVP and CFO at First Merchants]

When normalizing for the lower day count in the quarter, margin was stable on a linked quarter basis. Next, Slide 15 shows non-interest income. Non-interest income totaled $30 million, with customer-related fees of $27.1 million. Customer-related fees declined from last quarter, reflecting lower derivative hedge fees, card payment fees, and gains on sales of mortgage loans. The Q1 is always seasonally lower for our mortgage business, but we still had a strong start to the year, given gains this quarter were over 50% higher than the Q1 of last year. Moving to Slide 16, non-interest expense for the quarter totaled $92.9 million, a decrease of $3.4 million from prior quarter.

[Michele Kawiecki, EVP and CFO at First Merchants]

We completed a voluntary early retirement program in the Q1 of 2024, and as you can see on the bar chart on the bottom right, salaries and benefits have been lower in all subsequent quarters. We continue to demonstrate effective expense discipline to maintain our efficiency ratio, which was 54.54% for the quarter. Slide 17 shows our capital ratios. We continued to grow capital this quarter, with common equity tier 1 climbing to 11.5%. These strong capital ratios, along with our ample loan loss reserves, provide immense balance sheet strength against any economic uncertainty we may face this year and also provide great strategic flexibility. That concludes my remarks, and I will now turn it over to our Chief Credit Officer, John Martin, to discuss asset quality.

[John Martin, EVP and Chief Credit Officer at First Merchants]

Thanks, Michele. My remarks start on Slide 18. We had strong mid-single-digit commercial loan growth led by commercial industrial loans shown on line four. Total Investment Real Estate, or CRE, Non-Owner Occupied on line seven includes both stabilized or stabilizing properties and construction, land, and land development. We originate construction loans that meet secondary market underwriting standards, allowing properties to stabilize post-construction. Our expectation is that borrowers will either transition to the secondary market or proceed with a property sale. We continue to have ample room for new originations, given our concentration levels and are well below any regulatory threshold of concern. On slides 19 and 20, we provide more details on the loan portfolio. On Slide 19, the C&I classification includes Sponsor-Financed as well as owner-occupied CRE.

[John Martin, EVP and Chief Credit Officer at First Merchants]

I would highlight that our current line utilization increased again for the quarter from 46%-49%, contributing to roughly $71 million in growth in C&I loans. We saw some firms purchasing additional inventory in anticipation of the tariffs, while others were unfazed by the tariffs and continued to make inventory purchases at planned or increased levels. In the Sponsor-Financed portfolio, we have key credit metrics for the 90 platform companies. We underwrite to higher origination underwriting standards as compared to regular C&I loans and track the portfolio quarterly. This portfolio almost exclusively consists of single-bank deals for platform companies or private equity firms, as opposed to large, widely syndicated leverage loans from money center bank trading desks. Slide 20, we break out the Investment Non-Owner Occupied commercial real estate portfolio.

[John Martin, EVP and Chief Credit Officer at First Merchants]

Our office loans are detailed on the bottom half of the slide and represent only 1.8% of total loans, and potential issues are easily managed. The wheel chart on the bottom right details office portfolio maturities. Loans maturing in less than a year represent 25.2% of the portfolio, or roughly $60 million. Slide 21, i highlight this quarter's asset quality trends and position. Non-accrual loans were up $8.1 million, with 90 days past due declining to $4.3 million. NPAs and 90-day past due loans represent only 0.7% of total loans. The planned sale of the collateral for the $22 million non-performing multifamily property mentioned last quarter was delayed for several weeks, although the sale is scheduled to occur within the next 30 days without principal loss.

[John Martin, EVP and Chief Credit Officer at First Merchants]

Finishing out the slide, classified loans leveled and declined to end the quarter at 2.78% of loans, while net charge-offs were roughly $5 million for the quarter, or 15 basis points annualized. Moving to the asset quality roll forward Slide 22, in column 1Q25, new non-accruals on line two totaled $19.6 million, the largest of which was a $6.8 million C&I loan. We had a reduction from payoffs or changes in accrual status on line three of $5 million. Dropping down to line 11, 90-day delinquent loans decreased $1.6 million, with NPAs ending the quarter at $91.2 million.

[John Martin, EVP and Chief Credit Officer at First Merchants]

To summarize, asset quality remains stable. Classified loan balances have leveled and declined with 15 basis points of annualized charge-off. We have a solid quarter of C&I loan growth and have begun analyzing the impact of tariffs on new originations through relationship management discussions and quarterly portfolio reviews. I appreciate your attention, and I'll turn the call back over to Mark Hardwick.

[Mark Hardwick, CEO at First Merchants]

Yeah, thanks, John. Turning Slide 23, tangible book value per share, the compound annual growth rate on the bottom left continues to grow at a healthy 7% post-dividend, post-buyback, and post-acquisition rate. As Michele mentioned earlier in the call, tangible book value per share has also increased 9.1% in the last 12 Slide 24 represents our total asset CAGR of 11.9% during the last 10 years and highlights meaningful acquisitions that have materially added to our demographic footprint, fueling growth. We do believe in accretive M&A, but it's important to note that we focus on organic growth and high performance first. We are comfortable being selective in the M&A process, and April 1st marked the three-year anniversary of our last acquisition. As we look forward to the remainder of 2025, there has been an increase in volatility and uncertainty regarding the impacts of tariffs.

[Mark Hardwick, CEO at First Merchants]

Growth and credit may prove to be challenging, and our team maintains active and intensive discussions with our customer base to identify any early signs of stress. However, so far, we haven't identified any specific credit problems, and our loan pipeline remains very strong. At this point, we're sticking to our mid-to-high single-digit loan growth guidance for the year. Thanks for your attention and your investment in First Merchants. Now we are happy to take questions.

[Operator]

Thank you. As a reminder, to ask a question, please press star one one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. To withdraw your question, please press star one one again. One moment for questions. Our first question comes from Daniel Tamayo with Raymond James. You may proceed.

[Daniel Tamayo, VP of Banking at Raymond James]

Thank you. Good morning, everybody. Maybe just starting on the credit side, you were saying the multifamily NPA that was scheduled to pay off in the Q1 will now pay off in the Q2. Given that, do you think the—first of all, do you expect any kind of additional charge-offs related to that? It sounded like the answer was no, but just for clarity. Then, with that coming down, do you think you may have reached the peak in non-performing loans in the Q1, I guess assuming that we do not go into a meaningful recession here?

[John Martin, EVP and Chief Credit Officer at First Merchants]

Yeah. Hey, Daniel. It's John Martin. Yeah, to answer your questions in the order, we don't expect any additional loss and have a closing date set on that in a fairly short period of time here. I'm pretty optimistic at this moment about that closing in a fairly short order. As it relates to what would happen in the Q2, it should—that's going to be clearly one of the larger non-performers we have. We, on any given quarter, have things moving in and out, but there's not something that I see lined up behind it that would push that number in a material way any higher than it would be that of the $22 million coming out.

[Daniel Tamayo, VP of Banking at Raymond James]

Okay. Terrific. I guess another kind of smaller one, but kind of zooming in on the fee income, Michele, I'm not sure if you gave an expectation, but just curious on your thoughts on where that could land in the Q2 and beyond and kind of your underlying assumptions included in that in relation to mortgage banking, if you think that is going to be kind of softer or you are expecting more of a typical seasonal bounce here in the middle of the year.

[Michele Kawiecki, EVP and CFO at First Merchants]

Hey, Danny. Thanks for joining non-interest income, really, i think for all of our income statement categories, I'd probably reiterate the guidance that we provided in January as we still think those are the levels that we'll hit. On fee income, the guidance that we provided was we thought that we would have year-over-year mid-to-high single-digit growth. When you look at our mortgage team, they had a great quarter when you look at this Q1's performance this year compared to last year. They'll pick up steam in the remaining quarters given the seasonality of the business.

[Michele Kawiecki, EVP and CFO at First Merchants]

We expect double-digit growth in mortgage. Even looking at wealth management, although market volatility can be a bit of a headwind for the wealth business, we believe that team has the ability to grow in double digits as well. When you put non-interest income categories together, like BOLI, etc., we expect that mid-to-high single-digit growth year-over-year.

[Mark Hardwick, CEO at First Merchants]

I point out that the pipeline that I referenced, excuse me, on my slide is very strong for the mortgage group going into the Q2.

[Daniel Tamayo, VP of Banking at Raymond James]

That's great. Okay. I will step back. I appreciate you taking my questions.

[Mike Stewart, President at First Merchants]

Thanks, Danny.

[Operator]

Thank you. Our next question comes from Terry McEvoy with Stephens. You may proceed.

[Terry McEvoy, Managing Director at Stephens]

Hi. Good morning, everybody. First off, love the new updated pictures in the presentation. Looks like John elected to not wear a tie this time, so I just wanted to note that.

[John Martin, EVP and Chief Credit Officer at First Merchants]

Thanks a lot, Terry. Thanks a lot.

[Terry McEvoy, Managing Director at Stephens]

I like the beard as well. In terms of questions, on the loan yields, they were down more than we had modeled, and it impacted the margin. Could you maybe talk about the amount of fixed-rate loans that will be repricing over the next three quarters where you would have some pickup on the yields for those loans?

[Michele Kawiecki, EVP and CFO at First Merchants]

Yeah. We've got $190 million of fixed-rate loans through the end of 2025. And just as a reminder, the rate on those is about 4.65%.

[Terry McEvoy, Managing Director at Stephens]

Okay. John, since I mentioned your name, just a question on the Sponsor Finance. A good quarter of growth, the classifieds ticked a little bit higher. If my math is correct, I think that charge-off in the professional services came out of that portfolio. I know you provide great data, but are you seeing any concerns there just given the size and what I think was a charge-off last quarter?

[John Martin, EVP and Chief Credit Officer at First Merchants]

Yeah. You spotted that correctly. It did actually come out of that book. It was roughly $2.5 million. I would say, given what that portfolio is, how we underwrite it, on balance, I'm pretty pleased with how it's performed from a historical standpoint. That portfolio has a somewhat elevated level of classifieds because, quite frankly, we also grade more aggressively in that portfolio than we do in the rest of the book just because of the nature of the underwriting and the nature of the type of asset there. It has performed pretty well, and it continues to perform pretty well. Any given quarter, it can kind of bump up and down.

[John Martin, EVP and Chief Credit Officer at First Merchants]

There is not some underlying concern there. There are names in there that we continue to monitor and make sure that we're in touch with the sponsors. There is really good communication in that group with the sponsors. Again, I feel like it has performed the way I would expect given the higher spread and the higher underwriting that we put to it, if that helps.

[Terry McEvoy, Managing Director at Stephens]

It does. Appreciate that. Thanks for taking my questions.

[John Martin, EVP and Chief Credit Officer at First Merchants]

Thanks, Terry.

[Operator]

Thank you. Our next question comes from Damon DelMonte with KBW. You may proceed.

[Damon DelMonte, Managing Director of Equity Research at KBW]

Hey. Good morning, everyone. Hope everybody's doing well today. Michele, just wondering if you could just give us a little updated outlook on the expenses. Obviously, a very strong quarter to start the year. Just curious if your guidance from last quarter kind of still holds and kind of what your thoughts are around that.

[Michele Kawiecki, EVP and CFO at First Merchants]

Yeah. I think our guidance from last quarter does still hold. I mean, I think the guidance that we provided was that we thought we would have like 1%-3% expense growth over to the 2024 expense base. We're running ahead of that. Probably will all year, but I would probably still reiterate that level.

[Damon DelMonte, Managing Director of Equity Research at KBW]

Okay. Great. As far as the cash flows that are rolling off the securities portfolio, can you just remind us of the strategy there? Are you reinvesting some of that into higher-yielding securities, or are you kind of reallocating that to support loan growth?

[Michele Kawiecki, EVP and CFO at First Merchants]

Yeah. We're reallocating that to support loan growth. We're not reinvesting yet. We'll continue to use that cash for loan growth probably through the next couple of quarters.

[Damon DelMonte, Managing Director of Equity Research at KBW]

Okay. Great. I guess just lastly, given the strong capital, it's nice to see that you guys are executing on the buyback. Mark, just kind of curious on your thoughts on M&A as you kind of look across your footprint and potentially into other footprints. Any updated thoughts on conversations or change in strategy there?

[Mark Hardwick, CEO at First Merchants]

Yeah. No change in strategy. Just continue to stay close to the partners that we're most interested in. Anyone we're talking to is in Indiana, Ohio, or Michigan. Just given the volatility of stock prices, it's hard to create any real momentum.

[Damon DelMonte, Managing Director of Equity Research at KBW]

Got it. Okay. That's all that I had. Thank you very much.

[Michele Kawiecki, EVP and CFO at First Merchants]

Thanks, Damon.

[Mark Hardwick, CEO at First Merchants]

Thank you.

[Operator]

Thank you. Our next question comes from Nathan Race with Piper Sandler. You may proceed.

[Nathan Race, Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst at Piper Sandler]

Hi, everyone. Appreciate you taking the questions. Just circling back to the margin, Michele, just curious to kind of get your expectations for the Q2. Assuming the Fed remains on pause, it seems like you still have some deposit cost leverage, some repricing within the loan book as well, and kind of redeployment of excess liquidity to loans. Just kind of curious to get your expectations in terms of what we can expect in terms of the magnitude of potential expansion here in Q2.

[Michele Kawiecki, EVP and CFO at First Merchants]

Yeah. I mean, we would expect margin to remain relatively stable. I guess I should clarify stable excluding the day-count impact because our stated margin was 3.22% for Q1, but we had five basis points of decline that was due to the day count. If you add that back in to normalize it, I think that level seems like a good level to look forward to in the next coming quarters.

[Nathan Race, Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst at Piper Sandler]

Okay. In the back half of this year, I imagine it's still probably a safe assumption that you guys can kind of offset some of the headwinds on the floating rate book if we do get some Fed cuts, maybe one or two cuts in the back half of the year, just given some of the loan growth prospects that you have without being funded partially by the cash flow coming off the securities book. Is that still a fair assumption?

[Michele Kawiecki, EVP and CFO at First Merchants]

It is.

[Nathan Race, Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst at Piper Sandler]

In the back half of the year?

[Michele Kawiecki, EVP and CFO at First Merchants]

Yeah. The other thing we've been pretty successful at is repricing deposits. We've got a pretty strong downward beta. If we get a couple more Fed cuts in the back half of the year, I think that gives us some opportunity to reduce some costs again there as well that will help offset some of the repricing on the asset side.

[Nathan Race, Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst at Piper Sandler]

Okay. Great. I think, Mark, you reiterated that you still expect mid-to-high single-digit loan growth this year. Just curious how volumes are tracking so far here in the Q2, if you're seeing kind of any unusual activity in light of all the volatility of late, and just kind of any other commentary in terms of kind of the loan pipeline heading into the Q2 here.

[Mark Hardwick, CEO at First Merchants]

Yeah. I think Mike did a nice job covering it in the call. Just we were 5%, 4.8%, called 5% this quarter, 6% last quarter. For the Q2, the pipelines were really strong throughout the regional bank and Investment Real Estate categories. We are pretty optimistic about how we should at least continue through the remainder of the Q2. We will continue to assess the impact of tariffs on the customer base and whether or not it causes them to kind of start to pull back. Mike, anything you want to add?

[Mike Stewart, President at First Merchants]

April's off to a good start.

[Mark Hardwick, CEO at First Merchants]

Yeah.

[Nathan Race, Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst at Piper Sandler]

Okay. Great. If I could sneak one last one in for John, just maybe on the reserve and thinking about provisioning going forward, you guys obviously still have a really strong reserve level. Just curious, if we exclude any major CSO impacts tied to the environment and assuming credit remains fairly stable going forward, do you see much need to provide for growth, or can you kind of just kind of grow into kind of the unallocated excess reserves that exist?

[John Martin, EVP and Chief Credit Officer at First Merchants]

Yeah. I think we generally have targeted the 1.5% range. I think depending on what growth does and what happens with credit is going to ultimately, of course, drive whether we need to provide more. I think right now, we've basically been providing for any incremental credit issues with some incremental amount for growth. It has kind of wound up being at that 1.5% range. I don't know, Michele, if you want to.

[Michele Kawiecki, EVP and CFO at First Merchants]

Nope. I think that covers it.

[Nathan Race, Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst at Piper Sandler]

Okay. So it sounds like you're still targeting kind of staying kind of near the 1Q reserve level?

[Michele Kawiecki, EVP and CFO at First Merchants]

Yeah.

[Nathan Race, Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst at Piper Sandler]

Okay. Okay. Great. I appreciate all the color. Thanks, everyone.

[Michele Kawiecki, EVP and CFO at First Merchants]

Thanks, Nate.

[Operator]

Thank you. Our next question comes from Brian Martin with Janney. You may proceed.

[Brian Martin, Director of Banks and Thrifts at Janney]

Hey. Good morning.

[Mark Hardwick, CEO at First Merchants]

Good morning.

[Brian Martin, Director of Banks and Thrifts at Janney]

Michele, just wondering, I guess, can you just remind us what on the margin, just the impact, I guess, depending on how the Fed plays out here, the impact if we do see cuts on the margin, just kind of each 25 basis point cut, what do you expect the impact to be on that?

[Michele Kawiecki, EVP and CFO at First Merchants]

Our ALCO models would tell us that with each 25 basis point cut, that we would have maybe about two to three basis points of margin compression. When we did our plan for 2025, we had two cuts that we had originally built into the plan. We did have a bit of modest margin expansion. Some of that is due to the fact that we felt like we had some runway on being able to cut deposit costs to offset some of the asset repricing. So far, I think we've been, like I said, we've been successful with that. I think we did see some increased competition on deposits, I think more towards kind of the middle of this quarter and the back half of this quarter. That's the reason why at this point, I'd say we look for margin to be stable.

[Brian Martin, Director of Banks and Thrifts at Janney]

Gotcha. Okay. No, that's helpful. How about maybe just for John, I guess the reserves are just asked a question about that. It feels like credit's pretty healthy at this point, and the reserves are high. I guess what areas, I know it's early on with the tariffs, but as you kind of look at the book today, where do you see the most exposure or the most risk due to the tariffs that could creep into the credit side of the equation here as we get into the back half of the year? Just trying to identify the areas that you're focused on.

[John Martin, EVP and Chief Credit Officer at First Merchants]

Yeah. It's interesting, Brian. That question is so difficult to answer, as you know. It's so difficult to determine the impacts. It can hit or be in any place in a supply chain, but it is way too early, I think, to try to draw any conclusions about the impact. The tariffs aren't, when you look at them, they're not even. Where you might think or hear, read a headline that a tariff is, you dig into it more, and the customer has somehow been exempted out of it. We're analyzing the impact of the tariffs on initial underwriting. As we do our quarterly portfolio reviews in our larger and certain specific portfolios, Sponsor Finance is an example, we're asking the question what our borrowers might expect the impact to be and how they're dealing with it.

[John Martin, EVP and Chief Credit Officer at First Merchants]

We're not really able to quantify it and feed it back into any kind of analysis that would push the allowance in one direction or another.

[Mark Hardwick, CEO at First Merchants]

Yeah. Brian, I'm really pleased with the work we're doing internally. We've had a nice meeting internally and talked about trying to not regurgitate or not requote what we hear on the news and just say, "Let's talk about what we're hearing directly from our borrowers." Our credit teams, our commercial bankers, the RMs are actively communicating with customers and trying to find out exactly what they know and how they think it's going to impact their business. To John's point, it's really early. I'm proud of our customer base for how close they are to the risk and uncertainties, how smart they are. They're really capable business owners. It's too early for us to really give you direct numbers until this settles in.

[Brian Martin, Director of Banks and Thrifts at Janney]

Gotcha. Okay. Mark, just last one from me. Just on the capital front, I know you talked about the buyback. I guess that seems like the most likely path here. You guys have been active last quarter, this quarter to date. I guess is your plan, at this point, to continue to be assertive on the buyback and kind of executing this plan given the focus on organic growth, the tough market in terms of M&A at the moment? Is that, I guess, we should think about that being pretty solid execution on that buyback at current levels, certainly, I mean, opportunistic with the pricing?

[Mark Hardwick, CEO at First Merchants]

Yeah, it is. I mean, today's an interesting day. I thought we had a hell of an earnings announcement and beat all analysts' expectations. Our teams are focused on the plan. You think about there's lots of different ways you hear this, but it's, "Let's develop the plan, know the plan, and work the plan." That's what we're doing as a team. The stock's down 2% today. It's an environment where the minute we're outside of our quiet period, we're going to be active.

[Brian Martin, Director of Banks and Thrifts at Janney]

Gotcha. Okay. That is it for me. Just housekeeping, maybe, Michele, the tax rate going forward, I guess, keep it kind of where we're at today. Is that fair?

[Michele Kawiecki, EVP and CFO at First Merchants]

Yeah. Yeah. I think the range I would use would be between 13-14% for the effective tax rate.

[Brian Martin, Director of Banks and Thrifts at Janney]

Gotcha. Okay. Thank you for taking the questions.

[Michele Kawiecki, EVP and CFO at First Merchants]

You're welcome.

[Operator]

Thank you. Our next question comes from Daniel Tamayo with Raymond James. You may proceed.

[Daniel Tamayo, VP of Banking at Raymond James]

Thanks, guys. Just a quick follow-up here. You've talked about the impact, you just recently talked about the impact from tariffs on credit, how it's tough to gauge. Totally understand that. I guess zooming in and looking more on the demand side, zooming in on the construction portfolio, which I think you saw nice growth in the Q1 and talked about maybe gaining some share there. The Sponsor book, which came down a bit. Just curious how you think the tariffs are impacting demand on the construction side, maybe in terms of input costs and then on the Sponsor book overall, and how that might impact your growth guidance.

[Mark Hardwick, CEO at First Merchants]

Yeah. Daniel, the feedback we've been receiving directly is that on any project that's already under construction, they've priced out or have already priced in any impact that might affect their building costs for to completion. They've already kind of hedged that out. Anything that's new that's coming in, they're pricing it into quotes for the construction of new opportunities. Anything that we have or we're underwriting today will have those costs built into it. The contractors are out hedging that or at least pre-buying for a new construction. Anything that's already afoot has been accounted for. That's the feedback we're getting from the developer group. I don't know. Stew?

[Mike Stewart, President at First Merchants]

No, that's well said on the construction side. On the Sponsor side, or just M&A activity in general, it's just part of the analysis process that individuals or executive teams are doing. They're doing the same thing, understanding the impact, what it means to margins, what is it going to do to the valuation if there is any change. It might take them more time to do some analysis, but they're still active. Great. It sounds like on the construction side, the loans in process, those projects in process, if you will, they're even able to pass through any increase in input costs to the direct consumer is what you're hearing. Yeah.

[Mark Hardwick, CEO at First Merchants]

Yeah. They've already bought forward or hedged out what the impact of the tariff would be on what they had planned to buy.

[Mike Stewart, President at First Merchants]

On construction.

[Mark Hardwick, CEO at First Merchants]

On construction, yeah.

[Mike Stewart, President at First Merchants]

Escalator clauses or the fixed-rate contracts.

[Daniel Tamayo, VP of Banking at Raymond James]

Okay. Great. Appreciate the color.

[Mark Hardwick, CEO at First Merchants]

Yeah.

[Mike Stewart, President at First Merchants]

Thank you.

[Operator]

Thank you. I would now like to turn the call back over to Mark Hardwick for any closing remarks.

[Mark Hardwick, CEO at First Merchants]

Yeah. We appreciate all the attention, time that you're willing to give to understand our story the best you possibly can. We look forward, like I said, to just continued execution of the plan and the guidance that we've provided in the past. Again, thanks for your time. We'll talk to you next quarter.

[Operator]

Thank you. This concludes today's conference. Thank you for your participation and have a great day. You may now disconnect.

Participants

Executives

• Mike Stewart, President
• Mark Hardwick, CEO
• Michele Kawiecki, EVP and CFO
• John Martin, EVP and Chief Credit Officer

Analysts

• Nathan Race, Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst at Piper Sandler
• Terry McEvoy, Managing Director at Stephens
• Daniel Tamayo, VP of Banking at Raymond James
• Damon DelMonte, Managing Director of Equity Research at KBW
• Brian Martin, Director of Banks and Thrifts at Janney