First Financial Bancorp. Q2 2026 Earnings Call Transcript

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Provided by Quartr
July 22, 2026

Key Takeaways

  • Positive Sentiment: First Financial reported record adjusted net income of $83.9 million, or $0.80 per share, with an adjusted ROA of 1.5% and adjusted ROE of 19.7%, helped by continued loan growth and acquisition contributions.
  • Positive Sentiment: Loan growth remained strong, with balances up 7% annualized and originations up 23% sequentially, while management said pipelines remain healthy heading into the back half of the year.
  • Neutral Sentiment: Net interest margin held steady at 3.98%, and management expects it to remain in a 3.96%-4.01% range next quarter if rates stay unchanged, supported by lower deposit costs and stable core pricing.
  • Positive Sentiment: Credit quality improved during the quarter, with net charge-offs falling to 0.20% of loans, NPAs and classified assets declining, and ACL coverage rising to 1.38% of total loans.
  • Positive Sentiment: The company announced an agreement to acquire Finward Bancorp for about $208 million, a deal expected to be roughly 5% accretive to EPS with only slight tangible book dilution and a payback of just over half a year.
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Earnings Conference Call
First Financial Bancorp. Q2 2026
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Operator

Hello, everyone. Thank you for joining us, and welcome to the First Financial Bancorp second quarter 2026 earnings conference call and webcast. After today's prepared remarks, we will host a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please press star one to raise your hand. To withdraw your question, press star one again. I will now hand the conference over to Scott Crawley, Corporate Controller. Scott, please go ahead.

Scott Crawley
Scott Crawley
Corporate Controller at First Financial Bancorp

Thank you, Leah. Good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us on today's conference call to discuss First Financial Bancorp's second quarter financial results. Participating on today's call will be Archie Brown, President and Chief Executive Officer; Jamie Anderson, Chief Financial Officer; and Bill Harrod, Chief Credit Officer. Both the press release we issued yesterday and the accompanying slide presentation are available on our website at www.bankatfirst.com under the investor relations section. We will make reference to the slides contained in the accompanying presentation during today's call. Additionally, please refer to the forward-looking statement disclosure contained in the second quarter 2026 earnings release, as well as our SEC filings for a full discussion of the company's risk factors. The information we will provide today is accurate as of June 30th, 2026. We will not be updating any forward-looking statements to reflect facts or circumstances after this call.

Scott Crawley
Scott Crawley
Corporate Controller at First Financial Bancorp

I will now turn the call over to Archie Brown.

Archie Brown
Archie Brown
President and CEO at First Financial Bancorp

Thanks, Scott. Good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us on today's call. With second quarter earnings and the Finward announcement, we have a lot to cover, so the format of our call will be a little different today. Our plan for today's remarks is that I will start with my summary of the quarter, then turn over to Jamie, who will add his comments on the financial results. After Jamie is finished, I will provide thoughts on our third quarter outlook. Once I have wrapped up the outlook commentary, we will then pivot to discuss the details of the Finward acquisition, which is a deal that we are very excited about. After that, we will open it up for questions. The second quarter was another active quarter as we remained focused on post-integration efforts related to the Westfield acquisition and successfully converted BankFinancial systems.

Archie Brown
Archie Brown
President and CEO at First Financial Bancorp

Our second quarter operating results were strong, we're very pleased with our performance. Adjusted net income for the period was a record $83.9 million, or $0.80 per share, with an adjusted return on assets of 1.5% an adjusted return on tangible common equity of 19.7%. These adjusted earnings per share represent an 8% increase over the second quarter of 2025, they were driven by increases in earning assets from a combination of organic loan growth and our recent acquisitions. Our net interest margin was stable at approximately 4% as lower funding costs offset a decline in loan accretion income. Assuming no significant changes in interest rates, we expect our margin to remain stable over the near term.

Archie Brown
Archie Brown
President and CEO at First Financial Bancorp

Loan growth for the quarter was 7% on an annualized basis and reflected continued momentum across the portfolio with C&I, Agile, and Summit being the primary drivers of our increase in balances. Loan originations increased 23% over the first quarter, advanced stage pipelines remain strong heading into the back half of the year. We expect loan production to remain healthy and contribute to solid loan growth in the third quarter. Second quarter adjusted fee income was below our expectations. After a very strong first quarter, lower foreign exchange swap income and investment banking fees led to a decline in total non-interest income compared to the linked quarter. While results in these business lines can vary from quarter to quarter, we anticipate a rebound in the third quarter. Conversely, adjusted non-interest expenses were materially lower than the linked quarter driven by lower commission expense, payroll taxes, and acquisition-related synergies.

Archie Brown
Archie Brown
President and CEO at First Financial Bancorp

As of June 30th, virtually all the expected Westfield cost reductions have been realized, while savings related to the BankFinancial acquisition will gradually phase in over the course of the third quarter with full savings expected by quarter end. Asset quality was stable for the quarter with net charge-offs declining by 15 basis points to 0.20% of total loans. Capital levels remained strong with tangible common equity increasing to 8.2% and tangible book value increasing 3% from the linked quarter to $16.64. No shares were repurchased during the quarter as we focus on integrating recent acquisitions and preparing for the acquisition of Finward. Now I'll turn the call over to Jamie to discuss our second quarter results in greater detail. Jamie?

Jamie Anderson
Jamie Anderson
CFO at First Financial Bancorp

Thank you, Archie, good morning, everyone. Slides five, six, and seven provide a summary of our most recent financial results. The second quarter was another outstanding quarter, highlighted by strong earnings, 7% loan growth, a solid net interest margin, and positive credit trends. Our net interest margin remains very strong at 3.98%. Deposit costs declined six basis points from the linked quarter, while asset yields decreased seven basis points due to lower accretion income. Loan balances increased $240 million, or 7% on an annualized basis. Growth was broad-based with C&I, Summit, and Agile all having strong quarters. Average deposit balances increased $41 million due primarily to a seasonal influx in public funds and higher interest-bearing deposits. We maintained 21% of our total balances in non-interest-bearing accounts remain focused on growing lower cost deposit balances. Turning to the income statement.

Jamie Anderson
Jamie Anderson
CFO at First Financial Bancorp

Despite a decrease from the first quarter, second quarter fee income was solid, led by the leasing and foreign exchange business lines. Non-interest expenses declined from the linked quarter due to lower incentive-based compensation costs. Our ACL coverage increased two basis points during the quarter to 1.38% of total loans. We recorded $8.2 million of provision expense during the period, which was driven primarily by net charge-offs and loan growth. Overall, asset quality trends were positive. Net charge-offs declined 15 basis points to 20 basis points of loans on an annualized basis, while NPAs and classified assets also declined during the period. From a capital standpoint, our ratios are in excess of both internal and regulatory targets. Tangible book value increased to $16.64, while our TCE ratio increased to 8.2%.

Jamie Anderson
Jamie Anderson
CFO at First Financial Bancorp

Slide nine reconciles our GAAP earnings to adjusted earnings, highlighting items that we believe are important to understanding our quarterly performance. Adjusted net income was $83.9 million, or $0.80 per share for the quarter. Non-interest income was adjusted for losses on investment securities and $2.2 million of acquisition-related items. Non-interest expense adjustments exclude the impact of acquisition costs, tax credit, investment amortization, and other expenses not expected to recur. As depicted on Slide 10, these adjusted earnings equate to a return on average assets of 1.5%, a return on average tangible common equity of 20%, and a post-tax pre-provision ROA of over 2%. Turning to slides 11 and 12, net interest margin decreased one basis point from the linked quarter to 3.98%.

Jamie Anderson
Jamie Anderson
CFO at First Financial Bancorp

The core margin remains very strong, with a slight decline from the linked quarter driven by a five basis point decline in loan accretion, which was impacted by low prepayment rates on our acquired mortgage loans. Total deposit costs declined six basis points from the linked quarter, partially offsetting the impact of lower asset yields. Slide 14 illustrates our current loan mix and balance changes compared to the linked quarter. Loan balances increased 7% on an annualized basis, with growth across most of the portfolio, highlighted by C&I, Summit, and seasonal growth from Agile. Slide 16 depicts our MDFI exposure. As you can see, our total MDFI balances are approximately 3% of our total loan book, and all MDFI loans were pass rated at the end of the second quarter. The majority of our MDFI lending is concentrated in loans to REITs, which we believe further mitigates our risk.

Jamie Anderson
Jamie Anderson
CFO at First Financial Bancorp

Slide 17 depicts our average deposit mix, as well as the progression of average deposits from the linked quarter. In total, average deposit balances increased $41 million during the quarter, driven by a seasonal influx of public funds and growth in interest-bearing demand accounts. These increases were offset by declines in retail time deposits and brokered CDs. Absent the decline in brokered CDs, average deposits increased $169 million from the first quarter. Slide 19 highlights our non-interest income. Total adjusted fee income was $72 million, with leasing and foreign exchange income both delivering solid quarters. Additionally, other non-interest income increased $3.6 million for the quarter due to higher income from bank-owned life insurance and other limited partnership investments. Non-interest expense for the quarter is outlined on Slide 20. Core expenses decreased $5.7 million during the period, driven by lower compensation costs tied to lower fee income.

Jamie Anderson
Jamie Anderson
CFO at First Financial Bancorp

Turning now to slides 21 and 22, our ACL model resulted in a total allowance, which includes both funded and unfunded reserves of $208 million and $8.2 million of total provision expense during the period. This resulted in an ACL that was 1.38% of total loans, which was a two basis point increase from the first quarter. Provision expense was primarily driven by loan growth and net charge-offs, which were 20 basis points for the period, declining 15 basis points from the first quarter. Overall, credit trends were positive, with a 42% reduction in net charge-offs and slight declines in both non-performing and classified assets. Finally, as shown on slides 23 and 24, capital ratios remain in excess of both regulatory minimums and internal targets. During the first quarter, tangible book value increased to $16.64, while the TCE ratio increased to 8.2% at the end of the period.

Jamie Anderson
Jamie Anderson
CFO at First Financial Bancorp

At this point, our tangible book value exceeds pre-Westfield and BankFinancial levels. Our total shareholder return remains strong, with 34% of our second quarter earnings returned to our shareholders during the period through the common dividend. We're also very pleased that the board of directors voted to increase the common dividend going forward to $0.26 per share. We maintain our commitment to providing an attractive return to our shareholders, and we're evaluating capital actions that support that commitment. I'll now turn it back over to Archie for some comments on our outlook. Archie?

Archie Brown
Archie Brown
President and CEO at First Financial Bancorp

Thank you, Jamie. Before we conclude our prepared remarks, I want to comment on our third quarter outlook, which can be found on slide 25. In regard to the balance sheet, we expect mid-single-digit loan growth on an annualized basis, while on the deposit side, we expect low single-digit core deposit balance growth. Our net interest margin remains among the highest in the peer group, and we expect it will hold steady in a 3.96%-4.01% range over the next quarter. That assumes no changes in interest rates. This also assumes purchase accounting accretion that's in line with the second quarter. As for credit, we expect third quarter credit costs to approximate second quarter levels and ACL coverage to remain relatively stable as a percentage of loans.

Archie Brown
Archie Brown
President and CEO at First Financial Bancorp

I was pleased to see positive trends in our credit quality metrics in the second quarter. We see net charge-offs approximating 25-30 basis points for the back half of the year, consistent with our outlook for the last couple of years. On fee income, we expect foreign exchange and investment banking income to rebound and total fee income to be between $74 million and $77 million in the third quarter, which includes $15 million-$17 million for foreign exchange and $22 million-$24 million for leasing business revenue. Non-interest expenses are expected to be between $149 million and $152 million. We successfully completed the BankFinancial conversion in June, and we are on pace to achieve our modeled cost savings with full savings realized in the fourth quarter. Full savings from the Westfield acquisition will be in the third quarter run rate. Turning now to Finward.

Archie Brown
Archie Brown
President and CEO at First Financial Bancorp

As we announced late yesterday, we've agreed to acquire Finward Bancorp, the holding company for Peoples Bank. Finward currently has 24 banking locations. It's headquartered in Munster, Indiana, and as such, this acquisition is expected to strategically expand First Financial's ability to serve the consumers and businesses of the Chicagoland and Northwest Indiana markets. Finward has approximately $2 billion in assets, $1.7 billion in deposits, $1.5 billion in loans, and $412 million in wealth assets under management. We're very excited to partner with a bank with a similar operating philosophy and strong credit culture. Not only does this transaction demonstrate our commitment to strategic growth in the Northwest Indiana and Chicagoland markets, we believe the transaction is also an attractive one for our shareholders.

Archie Brown
Archie Brown
President and CEO at First Financial Bancorp

Under the terms of the agreement, each outstanding share of Finward common stock will be converted into the right to receive 1.35 shares of First Financial common stock, valuing the transaction at approximately $208 million based on First Financial's closing price on July 20th. In addition, we expect the transaction to be approximately 5% accretive to First Financial's earnings per share and First Financial's tangible book value per share at closing is estimated to be only slightly diluted with an anticipated tangible book value earn back of just over half a year. For further details on the transaction, please refer to the slides 26 through 33 in our deck. Including our recent acquisition of BankFinancial, we will have added $2.9 billion in lower cost deposits to our legacy operation in Northwest Indiana and have a total of $4.1 billion in deposits in Chicago and Northwest Indiana.

Archie Brown
Archie Brown
President and CEO at First Financial Bancorp

We'll have a branch network of over 40 offices. We'll have built an impressive combination of talent in commercial banking, mortgage banking, wealth management, and specialty bank solutions, complemented by our client-centered, community-focused business model that is the alternative to larger banks in the region. Through these two acquisitions, we expect to add approximately 8% in earnings per share accretion with no impact to tangible book value. The Chicago Northwest Indiana market will become the second largest market in our company. To demonstrate our further commitment to this market, First Financial's committed to donate $500,000 to its foundation for the benefit of local organizations in the communities served by Finward, in addition to the $1 million we donated to the foundation when we entered the Chicago market with the completion of the acquisition of BankFinancial in January of this year.

Archie Brown
Archie Brown
President and CEO at First Financial Bancorp

To wrap up my comments, the second quarter was another great quarter for our company. We achieved record earnings while successfully integrating two bank acquisitions and positioning the company for continued success in the second half of the year. Regarding the recently integrated Westfield and BankFinancial acquisitions, we're very pleased with how our newer associates have assimilated into the company. They remain deeply committed to serving their clients and communities. Their efforts have been instrumental in high client retention levels. We are thankful for their dedication, hard work, and client-focused approach over the past year. I'm very proud of the work our teams have done throughout the integration process. Their efforts position us for success in our newly expanded markets. Finally, we're really excited to announce our expansion in Northwest Indiana and Chicago with Finward. We look forward to the opportunities that this combination provides.

Archie Brown
Archie Brown
President and CEO at First Financial Bancorp

With that, we'll now open up the call for questions. Leah, go ahead and open up the lines. Thank you.

Operator

We will now begin the question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please press star one to raise your hand. To withdraw your question, press star one again. We ask that you pick up your handset when asking a question to allow for optimum sound quality. If you are muted locally, please remember to unmute your device. Please stand by while we compile the Q&A roster. Your first question from the line of Brendan Nosal with Hovde Group. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Brendan Nosal
Brendan Nosal
Analyst at Hovde Group

Hey, good morning, guys. Hope you're doing well.

Archie Brown
Archie Brown
President and CEO at First Financial Bancorp

Morning, Brendan.

Brendan Nosal
Brendan Nosal
Analyst at Hovde Group

Morning. Maybe starting off here on capital, just in light of the Finward deal. I guess you're using some capital, but honestly not that much for the transaction. Two parts. One, with three deals in short order, are you on the M&A sidelines now, or is there still an ability to transact? Two, last quarter, you started talking about a higher total payout ratio. Curious for your updated thoughts in light of the Finward announcement.

Archie Brown
Archie Brown
President and CEO at First Financial Bancorp

Brendan. This is Archie. I'll answer the first part and then have Jamie answer the second part. You're right, this is the third transaction. I think we closed, of course, BankFinancial in January, converted it in June. Finward, we would hope we would close by year-end and then convert sometime in the second quarter of next year. Relative to our size, this is a fairly smaller incremental deal. Very strategic. We think it's very important for what we're doing in that part of our footprint, but it is somewhat incremental. We don't see ourselves on the sideline, but there's just a window here where opportunities are popping up, we'll assess them as they come. We don't see anything in the near term, I would say near to intermediate term, that we're focused on other than getting Finward closed and integrated as a company.

Archie Brown
Archie Brown
President and CEO at First Financial Bancorp

That's probably our work the next, let's say four quarters or so, we'll just see what happens as we get into 2027.

Jamie Anderson
Jamie Anderson
CFO at First Financial Bancorp

Brendan, this is Jamie. On this return of capital question, part of the question you had there. Just with the common dividend, we kind of look in that 35%-40% range. I think we're right in that mid-30s right now. We talked about, I think, the last quarter bumping that up to include some buybacks. With the deal kind of in process in the second quarter, we held off on the buyback. I think here going forward, we'll be in the market. We're kind of looking at our capital and our earnings as kind of breaking them up into three parts with a third-ish getting returned through the common dividend, a third retaining for organic growth and potentially some small M&A like we're doing now. Allocating a third for a buyback.

Jamie Anderson
Jamie Anderson
CFO at First Financial Bancorp

I think that's the plan kind of long-term going forward.

Brendan Nosal
Brendan Nosal
Analyst at Hovde Group

Fantastic. That's helpful color from both of you. Pivoting to fee income. As always, you give really good color on expectations for the lease and forex lines. Just help us with client derivative fees and kind of the wealth management piece. I guess there was an investment banking component for wealth this quarter. Just kind of help us on what was going on this quarter, and then how those kind of fit into the fee outlook going forward.

Archie Brown
Archie Brown
President and CEO at First Financial Bancorp

Sure. Brendan, this is Archie again. On foreign exchange, it's a little bit lower than Q1, a little bit lower maybe than their run rate. If you look at it for the first half of the year, Q1, Q2, we always said this has some lumpiness to it. We don't typically look at it in one quarter of isolation. If you look at it even over the first half of this year and compare it to the first half of last year, they're up about almost 12% in revenue. This year, 29.4% first half, last year 26.3%. They're doing fine. They do have lumpiness.

Archie Brown
Archie Brown
President and CEO at First Financial Bancorp

We've always said there's a core part of their business, a lot of small transactions, and then they have some chunky pieces that are a little bit larger based on some of the clients they work with, especially those who may be buying or selling companies. That creates a bit of chunkiness in their results. We look at it over longer windows to see how they're doing. Right now, for the first half of the year, they're on plan versus our internal budget and doing quite a bit better than last year. On the wealth side, we have a small M&A advisory practice. It really makes up our investment banking income. Again, it's very small. It probably does $5 million-$6 million a year in revenue. You think about it, kind of a million and a half a quarter would be kind of an average.

Archie Brown
Archie Brown
President and CEO at First Financial Bancorp

Again, it's chunky. Coming into the quarter, we had two deals we expected to get done in the quarter, they both just got pushed. We expect those to happen in the third quarter. There's a nice pipeline of other deals, they just get closed when they get closed. It's just a small enough business that if you don't get one, it changes what happens there.

Brendan Nosal
Brendan Nosal
Analyst at Hovde Group

Okay. Thank you for taking my questions. Much appreciated.

Archie Brown
Archie Brown
President and CEO at First Financial Bancorp

Yeah, you're welcome.

Operator

Yes.

Operator

Your next question is from the line of Daniel Tamayo with Raymond James. Your line is open.

Daniel Tamayo
Daniel Tamayo
Analyst at Raymond James

Thank you.

Operator

Please go ahead.

Daniel Tamayo
Daniel Tamayo
Analyst at Raymond James

All right. Thanks, guys. Still with Raymond James, by the way, but moving on.

Archie Brown
Archie Brown
President and CEO at First Financial Bancorp

Hey, Danny.

Daniel Tamayo
Daniel Tamayo
Analyst at Raymond James

Hey, Archie and Jamie. I guess first just on the deal, curious what your plans are for the Finward balance sheet. Any sales considered in terms of anything on the loan side, securities book? Curious what you're going to do with that and bigger picture, how you see the size of the balance sheet trending over the next several quarters.

Archie Brown
Archie Brown
President and CEO at First Financial Bancorp

Yeah, Danny, on the loan side, good news that the asset quality is strong, stable. We just see that we'll bring in an actually talented team of bankers. We don't have that that big of a team up there. We're going to incorporate the bankers from Finward into our team, we're going to add capacity for them and products and capabilities. If anything, we can do more with the clients they have and go out and I think probably create a faster run rate for growth overall. As far as the loans on the books, we're going to retain those and incorporate them into our balance sheet overall, then just, again, try to use that team to go deeper with their clients and bigger. On the security side, Jamie will cover.

Jamie Anderson
Jamie Anderson
CFO at First Financial Bancorp

Yeah. Danny, on the security side, I think what we'll end up doing just because typically these smaller banks will have a lot of different pieces and CUSIPs, we'll probably blow a lot of it out. That all gets accounted for in purchase accounting. We already have that, I guess, their unrealized loss built into the accretion in the deal. We'll basically blow it out and reinvest it at current rates, which is what purchase accounting does anyway. Nothing really any big change in the balance sheet. Nothing like we had on BankFinancial where we sold the big chunk of loans. It's really just kind of, I would say, selling and reinvesting into more of our philosophy on the investment side, nothing radical that would change the math or anything.

Daniel Tamayo
Daniel Tamayo
Analyst at Raymond James

Okay. In terms of, I know it's a tough question, ultimate balance sheet. The trajectory of the balance sheet post-close. You expect, and this kind of wraps in a question on the legacy bank. Obviously you've been kind of staying flattish, maybe modest growth, just overall balance sheet despite the sizable loan growth. Is that probably still the plan over the next several quarters as the balance sheet kind of continues to normalize?

Jamie Anderson
Jamie Anderson
CFO at First Financial Bancorp

Yeah. Daniel, this is Jamie. I think you're talking about last quarter, we talked about kind of going forward what our plan was in terms of earning assets. I think with the loan growth that we see going forward, if we look at our balance sheet now, the securities portfolio is a little bit outsized compared to what we would normally run, just because of all the cash that we got in in the first quarter from BankFinancial. They already had a fairly low loan-to-deposit ratio, and then we sold about $400 million of their loans. We basically got about $1 billion in excess funding there, which we put most of that to work in the securities portfolio for the time being.

Jamie Anderson
Jamie Anderson
CFO at First Financial Bancorp

Over time here, and really when I say over time, it's probably over the next one to two years, we'll let that securities portfolio kind of bleed back down. Our plan for the short term is that we're funding roughly about 50% of the loan growth through the cash flow in the securities portfolio. If we're growing loans in that kind of mid to high single digits, call it 6%, 7%, about half of that will get funded through the securities portfolio, and half of that will be earning asset growth.

Daniel Tamayo
Daniel Tamayo
Analyst at Raymond James

Great. That's very helpful. Appreciate it. I guess just last one for you, Archie, on the M&A side, just more high level. You mentioned this is now Chicago is now your second biggest market. Does that feel like it's a good size for you post close of this deal that you're fine kind of growing organically going forward, or are you still interested in opportunities to further the penetration in Chicago?

Archie Brown
Archie Brown
President and CEO at First Financial Bancorp

Yeah. I think, Daniel, $4 billion at least gets us to a place where we've got a platform to grow with talent, which when we're smaller, it's harder to do. I think we've got ourselves to the level we can do that now. Also, spend more money on the brand and introducing the brand to the market. We're probably better able to do that. I think there's opportunities in that market still, and I think these two companies that, well, one we've closed and now the one that we are announcing yesterday, will give us opportunities to probably have some more conversation discussions over the next one or two years. We think there's more to do, but I think if this is where we landed, it's big enough.

Daniel Tamayo
Daniel Tamayo
Analyst at Raymond James

Okay. Well, great. Thanks for all the color, guys. Appreciate it.

Archie Brown
Archie Brown
President and CEO at First Financial Bancorp

Thanks.

Operator

Your next question from the line of Brandon Rud with Stephens Inc.. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Brandon Rud
Brandon Rud
Analyst at Stephens Inc

Morning. I just have maybe my first one on expenses. With the close at the end of this year, can you maybe kind of talk about when the conversion takes place, and in which quarter next year do you think you have 100% of the cost saves realized?

Jamie Anderson
Jamie Anderson
CFO at First Financial Bancorp

Right. Yeah. Right now, obviously we're early in the process through the application process and whatnot, but we are anticipating that we would close at the end of the year, so call it January 1. We think that the conversion then would take place sometime in the second quarter. If you just said right now, let's just say the conversion takes place in the middle of the second quarter, then we would realize cost savings. Those would bleed in a little bit post-conversion, so call it, you'd probably have 90 days after that conversion. If you said as of the end of the third quarter of next year, everything would be fully baked in. I guess the first full quarter of all the cost savings would be the fourth quarter of next year.

Brandon Rud
Brandon Rud
Analyst at Stephens Inc

Gotcha. Okay, perfect. Thank you for that. Can you talk about the trajectory for your core margin on a go-forward basis? What I mean by that is when you look at new balance sheet growth, where are you seeing new loan yields come on a blended basis? Then same for blended interest-bearing deposit costs.

Jamie Anderson
Jamie Anderson
CFO at First Financial Bancorp

Yeah. Right now, I would say absent any changes in rates, we look at our margin here going forward as being relatively flat. I guess the only variable there, which is what we had in the second quarter, would be on the accretion income front. If we're at 398, I think the bias here going forward is we see a little bit of a slight uptick in deposit costs, and that's mainly due to, on the CDs side, those repricing slightly higher than what we have on the books right now. The same thing on the loan side. In the second quarter, essentially our origination yields and payoff yields were essentially right on top of each other. We get the loan side. We get a little bit of growth. We'll get a little bit of net interest income dollars growth.

Jamie Anderson
Jamie Anderson
CFO at First Financial Bancorp

We see the margin staying relatively flat. Now, here going forward, obviously the markets are indicating the next movement in rates could be rates going up, which would obviously help us from a margin standpoint. At this point, post BankFinancial and Westfield, we're still asset sensitive. Slightly less than what we were maybe a year or so ago, or a year or two ago. We see a 25 basis point rate hike helps us initially about seven or eight basis points. Because the loans are going to move right away with SOFR, and then the deposit costs will bleed in over time. As everything kind of stabilizes at 25 basis point increases about, call it around three or four basis points of increase in the margin.

Brandon Rud
Brandon Rud
Analyst at Stephens Inc

Got it. Thank you very much for the color, and I appreciate for taking my questions.

Jamie Anderson
Jamie Anderson
CFO at First Financial Bancorp

All right. Brandon.

Archie Brown
Archie Brown
President and CEO at First Financial Bancorp

Thanks, Brandon.

Brandon Rud
Brandon Rud
Analyst at Stephens Inc

Yep.

Archie Brown
Archie Brown
President and CEO at First Financial Bancorp

Take care.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Brian Foran with Truist Securities. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Brian Foran
Brian Foran
Analyst at Truist Securities

Oh, hey. I had one question on M&A, then one follow-up on the new loan production yields. To start on M&A, it just feels like with other banks, it's almost like a truism that you got to accept tangible book value dilution upfront. You get the earnings accretion, hopefully going forward, and you kind of solve for a three-year earn back. When we look at these deals you've done and the ability to generate 20% accretion now across the three deals with really not much impact on tangible book, would you say it was more just unique opportunities, or is there something you're doing in the type of deals you're looking for, the way you're structuring the transactions that this is more of a sustained thing you can do going forward as well if opportunities arise?

Archie Brown
Archie Brown
President and CEO at First Financial Bancorp

Yeah. Brian, this is Archie. Hey, I wish we could bottle that and do it every time. I think it's probably unique circumstances. Certainly the BankFinancial case, that was so and I think we ended up with a bargain purchase gain there. You think about this one, I think the big driver is just the differentiation in our price to tangible versus Finward's. That's probably a significant part of this. Don't know that we can always find those opportunities that way. We are disciplined that we certainly wouldn't want to go over three. We liked, I think, the size of this one and the differential in price to tangible were the drivers for the earn back math. It's kind of going to be situational. We are going to stay within a pretty tight discipline with regard to how we do it to capital.

Brian Foran
Brian Foran
Analyst at Truist Securities

Then maybe on the new loan deals, I know you all have been pretty intentional about building a pretty diversified platform, and maybe that's serving you well in the current environment. A lot of your peers are kind of starting to point to new production being below the existing book and creating some margin pressure. As you break apart all the pockets of loans you have, is it kind of across the board that it's relatively equal, or are there maybe some unique or niche businesses that, or markets that are maybe coming in a little better, and that's why maybe you're not seeing the same trend that some of the peers are citing?

Jamie Anderson
Jamie Anderson
CFO at First Financial Bancorp

Yeah, Brian. Hey, it's Jamie. Yeah, like I mentioned, essentially the origination and payoff yields were right on top of each other for the second quarter within 5-10 basis points. That's for the whole portfolio. Yeah, there are some, I would say some puts and takes in there, and where we are getting, picking up I think a little bit of yield and spread that's kind of offsetting the payoffs is really in the specialty lines that we have. I think that makes up about 15%-20% of the loan book, and that's where we really saw, especially in the second quarter, a decent amount of our growth. I think that is helping prop those yields up a little bit.

Jamie Anderson
Jamie Anderson
CFO at First Financial Bancorp

I mean, overall, we're seeing some deterioration in spreads and yield and resulting yields in what I would call the core bank, but it's not significant. Again, we're able to kind of offset that with the specialty lines.

Brian Foran
Brian Foran
Analyst at Truist Securities

Great. Thank you so much.

Jamie Anderson
Jamie Anderson
CFO at First Financial Bancorp

Yep.

Archie Brown
Archie Brown
President and CEO at First Financial Bancorp

Thanks, Brian.

Operator

As a reminder, to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone keypad to raise your hand. Your next question comes from the line of Henry Walczak, private investor. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Henry Walczak
Shareholder at Private Investor

Good morning, Archie and crew. Hey, I just got a small comment here. Thanks for buying Finward, or the old NorthWest Indiana Bancorp. Hey, you guys are really making my summer super. Also thanks for buying BankFinancial. I also had positions in those two companies. Again, super thanks for raising our dividend by a penny. It helps us all that are on Social Security. Thank you. I pull back.

Archie Brown
Archie Brown
President and CEO at First Financial Bancorp

Thank you, Henry. We look forward to providing more value for our shareholders. We're glad that you feel good about the announcement.

Operator

This concludes the question and answer session. I will now turn the call back to Archie Brown for closing remarks.

Archie Brown
Archie Brown
President and CEO at First Financial Bancorp

Thank you, Leah. Thanks, everybody, for joining us today. We're excited about the year. We're excited about the announcement of Finward and integrating it into the company and building a much bigger market in northwest part of our footprint. Thanks for following us. We look forward to talking to you again next quarter. Have a nice day. Bye now.

Operator

This concludes today's call. Thank you for attending. You may now disconnect.

Executives
Analysts
    • Scott Crawley
      Corporate Controller at First Financial Bancorp
    • Jamie Anderson
      CFO at First Financial Bancorp
    • Brendan Nosal
      Analyst at Hovde Group
    • Daniel Tamayo
      Analyst at Raymond James
    • Brandon Rud
      Analyst at Stephens Inc
    • Brian Foran
      Analyst at Truist Securities
    • Henry Walczak
      Shareholder at Private Investor
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