First Financial Bancorp. (NASDAQ:FFBC) Q3 2025 Earnings Call Transcript

First Financial Bancorp. (NASDAQ:FFBC) Q3 2025 Earnings Call Transcript October 24, 2025

Operator: Thank you for standing by, and welcome to the First Financial Bancorp Third Quarter 2025 Earnings Conference Call and Webcast. [Operator Instructions] I’d now like to turn the call over to Scott Crawley. You may begin.

Scott Crawley: Thank you, Rob. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us on today’s conference call to discuss First Financial Bancorp’s third quarter and year-to-date 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’ll 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 third quarter 2025 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 September 30, 2025, and we will not be updating any forward-looking statements to reflect facts or circumstances after this call. I’ll now turn it over to Archie Brown.

Archie Brown: Thanks, Scott. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us on today’s call. Yesterday afternoon, we announced our financial results for the third quarter. The third quarter of ’25 was another outstanding quarter for First Financial. Adjusted net income was $72.6 million and adjusted earnings per share were $0.76, which resulted in an adjusted return on assets of 1.55% and an adjusted return on tangible common equity of 19.3%. We achieved record revenue in the third quarter, driven by a robust net interest margin and record noninterest income. We have successfully maintained asset yields while moderating our funding costs, which combined to result in an industry-leading net interest margin. In addition, our diverse income streams remained a positive differentiator for us with our adjusted noninterest income representing 31% of total net revenue for the quarter.

Expenses continue to be well managed. Excluding incentives tied to strong performance and the record fee income, total noninterest expenses were flat compared to the second quarter. Our workforce efficiency efforts continued during the period. And to date, we’ve successfully reduced our full-time equivalents by approximately 200 or 9% since we began the initiative 2 years ago. We expect further efficiencies subsequent to the integration of our pending acquisitions. Loan balances declined modestly during the quarter, falling short of our expectations. Lower production in our specialty businesses along with a greater percentage of construction originations, which fund over time drove the modest decline. Loan pipelines are very healthy as we enter the fourth quarter, and we expect to return to mid-single-digit loan growth to close out the year.

Asset quality metrics were stable for the third quarter. Nonperforming assets were flat as a percent of assets and annualized net charge-offs were 18 basis points, which was a slight improvement from the linked quarter. We’re very happy that our strong earnings led to continued growth in tangible book value per share and tangible common equity during the quarter. Tangible book value per share of $16.19 increased 5% from the linked quarter and 14% from a year ago, while tangible common equity increased 47 basis points from June 30 to 8.87% at the end of September. I’ll now turn the call over to Jamie to discuss these results in greater detail. And after Jamie is done, I’ll wrap up with some additional forward-looking commentary and closing remarks.

Jamie?

James Anderson: Thank you, Archie, and good morning, everyone. Slides 4, 5 and 6 provide a summary of our most recent financial results. The third quarter was another exceptional quarter with outstanding earnings, robust net interest margin and record fee income. Our net interest margin remains very strong at 4.02%. Asset yields declined slightly while we managed deposit costs to a modest increase. Loan balances declined slightly during the quarter as production slowed in our specialty lending areas and slower funding construction originations increased as a percentage of the portfolio. Average deposit balances increased $157 million due to higher broker deposits and money markets, offset by a seasonal decline in public funds.

We maintained 21% of our total balances in noninterest-bearing accounts and remain focused on growing lower-cost deposit balances. Turning to the income statement. Third quarter fee income was another record, led by our leasing and foreign exchange businesses. Additionally, we had higher syndication fees and income on other investments. Noninterest expenses increased from the linked quarter due to an increase in incentive compensation, which is tied to fee income. Our efficiency efforts continue to impact our results positively and remain ongoing. Our ACL coverage increased slightly during the quarter to 1.38% of total loans. We recorded $9.1 million of provision expense during the period, which was driven by net charge-offs. Overall, asset quality trends were in line with expectations with lower net charge-offs and nonperforming asset balances remaining flat.

Net charge-offs were 18 basis points on an annualized basis, while NPAs and classified assets were both relatively flat for the period. From a capital standpoint, our ratios are in excess of both internal and regulatory targets. Tangible book value increased $0.79 to $16.19, while our tangible common equity ratio increased 47 basis points to 8.87%. Slide 7 reconciles our GAAP earnings to adjusted earnings, highlighting items that we believe are important to understanding our quarterly performance. Adjusted net income was $72.6 million or $0.76 per share for the quarter. Noninterest income was adjusted for a small loss on the sale of investment securities, while noninterest expense adjustments exclude the impact of acquisition and efficiency costs, tax credit investment write-downs and other expenses not expected to recur.

As depicted on Slide 8, these adjusted earnings equate to a return on average assets of 1.55%, a return on average common equity of 19% and a pretax pre-provision ROA of 2.15%. Turning to Slides 9 and 10. Net interest margin decreased 3 basis points from the linked quarter to 4.02%. Asset yields declined 2 basis points from the prior quarter, while total funding costs increased 1 basis point. Slide 12 illustrates our current loan mix and balance changes compared to the linked quarter. Loan balances decreased $72 million during the period. As you can see on the right, the decline was driven by decreases in the Oak Street, ICRE and C&I portfolios, which outpaced growth in Summit and consumer. Slide 14 shows our deposit mix as well as the progression of average deposits from the linked quarter.

In total, average deposit balances increased $157 million during the quarter, driven primarily by a $166 million increase in brokered CDs and a $106 million increase in money market accounts. These increases were offset by a seasonal decline in public funds. Slide 16 highlights our noninterest income for the quarter. Total fee income increased to $73.6 million during the quarter, which was the highest quarter in the history of the company. Bannockburn and Summit both had solid quarters. Additionally, other noninterest income increased $2.8 million for the quarter due to higher syndication fees and elevated income on other investments. Noninterest expense for the quarter is outlined on Slide 17. Core expenses increased $5.7 million during the period.

This was driven by higher incentive compensation related to fee income and the overall strong performance by the company. Turning now to Slides 18 and 19. Our ACL model resulted in a total allowance, which includes both funded and unfunded reserves of $180 million and $9.1 million of total provision expense during the period. This resulted in an ACL that was 1.38% of total loans, which was a 4 basis point increase from the second quarter. Provision expense was primarily driven by net charge-offs, which were 18 basis points for the period. Additionally, our NPAs to total assets held steady at 41 basis points and classified asset balances totaled 1.18% of total assets. We continue to believe that we have modeled conservatively to build a reserve that reflects the losses we expect from our portfolio.

We anticipate our ACL coverage will remain relatively flat in future periods as our model responds to changes in the macroeconomic environment. Finally, as shown on Slides 20 and 21, capital ratios remain in excess of regulatory minimums and internal targets. During the third quarter, tangible book value increased to $16.19, while the TCE ratio increased 47 basis points to 8.87%. Our total shareholder return remains strong with 33% of our earnings returned to our shareholders during the period through the common dividend. We maintain our commitment to provide an attractive return to our shareholders, and we continue to evaluate capital actions that support that commitment. I’ll now turn it back over to Archie for some comments on our outlook.

Archie?

Archie Brown: Thank you, Jamie. Before we conclude our prepared remarks, I want to comment on our outlook for the fourth quarter, which can be found on Slide 22. As we close the year, we expect origination volumes to increase, which should accelerate our growth. Specific to the fourth quarter, excluding Westfield, we expect loan growth to be in the mid-single digits on an annualized basis. We expect core deposit balances to increase and combined with seasonal public fund inflows to result in strong deposit growth. Our net interest margin remains among the highest in the peer group, and we expect it to be in a range between 3.92% and 3.97% over the next quarter, assuming a 25 basis point rate cut in both October and December.

This includes a modest bump in margin from the addition of Westfield in early November. We expect our fourth quarter credit cost to approximate third quarter levels and ACL coverage to remain stable as a percent of loans. We’re estimating fee income to be between $77 million and $79 million, which includes $18 million to $20 million for foreign exchange and $21 million to $23 million for the leasing business revenue. This range includes the expected impact from Westfield. Noninterest expense is expected to be between $142 million and $144 million and reflect our continued focus on expense management. This range includes the impact from Westfield, which is expected to approximately — to be approximately $8 million for the month of November and December.

While we remain confident that we will realize our modeled cost savings, we expect the majority of those savings to materialize in the middle of 2026 once Westfield has been fully integrated. With respect to our pending acquisitions, we have received formal regulatory approval for the Westfield transaction and anticipate closing in early November. Our initial preparations for the BankFinancial close are underway, and we are more excited than ever to expand our reach into the Chicago market. We have filed the necessary applications and expect to receive approval from the regulators in coming months, eyeing a close during the first quarter of 2026. We’re very excited to have the Westfield and BankFinancial associates join our team. In summary, we’re very proud of our financial performance through the first 9 months of the year, which resulted in industry-leading profitability.

We expect to have another strong quarter to close 2025 and build positive momentum as we head into 2026. With that, we’ll now open up the call for questions. Rob?

Q&A Session

Operator: Your first question today comes from the line of Brendan Nosal from Hovde Group.

Brendan Nosal: Maybe just starting off here on a topic that’s of interest today, NDFI loan exposure. I think if I look at your reg filings from last quarter, it’s a little over $450 million or 4% of loans. I know that it’s not huge, but can you just kind of walk us through that book and let us know whether that exposure falls into any of the known commercial verticals that you already have today?

Archie Brown: Yes. Brendan, we’ll have Bill Harrod cover that. All right. Great. We’ve got, as of the end of the quarter, about $434 million in the NDFI portfolio. It’s a diversified, conservatively managed and anchored in high investment grade tier with currently no adversely rated credit. The bulk of the portfolio is made up of traditional REITs of about $304 million across 46 notes, averaging about $7 million, consisting of a variety of public traded or privately held entities with investment grade or equivalent. We do have a securitization book within that portfolio of $73 million across 7 relationships with loans structured using S&P methodology to high investment-grade ratings. And we monitor those on a monthly basis with borrowing bases and independent third-party exams on a routine basis. And that makes up the bulk of what we have in that NDFI portfolio.

Brendan Nosal: Awesome. That’s really helpful color. Maybe turning to the net interest margin. I totally get the guide for next quarter, no surprise given recent and forthcoming rate cuts. I’m just kind of curious, so if we get those 2 cuts in the fourth quarter, how should we think about margin early in next year? I think in the past, you said that each cut is 5 to 6 basis points of near-term pressure before it grinds back up on lag funding costs. So any color there would be helpful.

James Anderson: Yes, Brendan, this is Jamie. So on the margin, and again, so the other thing you have to keep in mind is we have Westfield coming into the mix. So that’s going to create a little bit of noise, and it actually helps us going forward here, mitigate a little bit of our asset sensitivity. So — but if you look at kind of the legacy, the legacy company and the margin, the way that it reacts to those 25 basis point cuts, like I said, and you mentioned it as well, we get about 5 basis points of margin pressure for each of those 25 basis point cuts. And the way — the timing of that, the way that will kind of fold in is that you get a little bit more pain immediately from the cut. And then as deposit costs catch up, we start to actually move that back up.

So — but really 5 basis points of pressure. So if you think about our margin right now in that 4% range, if we get those 2, then we kind of start the year in that [ 3.90-ish ] range. But then when you factor in Westfield and with the purchase accounting and how that will work, we get a little bit of improvement in the margin from them. So it starts to help mitigate some of that pressure if we have those expected rate cuts here at the end of the year.

Operator: Your next question comes from the line of [ Mark Shootley ] from KBW.

Unknown Analyst: Maybe one more on the margin. I’m trying to think about on the asset side, loan yields were strong and actually ticked up in the quarter. So I was just curious like what new loan originations are coming on today with you guys sort of returning to growth and what you’re expecting for the total sort of portfolio yield in the near term?

Archie Brown: Yes, Mark, this is Archie. I’ll start, and Jamie, you can kind of comment on me if you want to amplify. But the rate cut certainly that we had affects origination yields as well. And so we were probably before the cut around 7% on origination yields, and it’s closer, I guess, high 6s. So you said 6.80%, 6.90% and it’s going to come in closer to the mid-6s you look at the month of September, it was probably right around 6.50%, maybe 6.50% and change. So we’d say sort of right now in that range, maybe drop down a little bit more with some more rate cuts because, again, a lot of we do is commercial oriented tied to variable rates.

James Anderson: Yes. And Mark, I mean, like we’ve talked about in previous quarters, if you — again, looking at the legacy First Financial portfolio, absent Westfield, we still have about 60% of our loan book that moves on the short end. So obviously, those cuts will impact the yield on the loan side.

Unknown Analyst: Yes, that makes sense. And then maybe just on the growth — so you mentioned the pipelines are strong, and I was just curious like what specific verticals or markets you expect to drive that growth over the next couple of quarters?

Archie Brown: Yes, Mark, this is Archie again. Yes, maybe talk about loan growth kind of overall. Our production, if you just look at total commitments, Q3 was on par with Q2. So pretty strong. I would argue it’s the strongest of the year in both cases. But we saw the actual fundings from that drop compared to what we saw in prior quarter. So lower fundings, primarily construction related. And then we did see a dip in line utilization on the commercial side that accounted for a little bit of the — little bit of lower overall growth in the quarter. As we look in Q4, strong commercial is the biggest driver. We’ve got different verticals within commercial, but strong commercial is the big driver. Summit funding, this is always their peak quarter for production.

So that will be another big driver. Commercial real estate will have a little bit of growth is what we’re projecting in Q4. And probably the only vertical that has a little bit of pressure is in our Oak Street Group. Just it looks like they’ve got a lot more payoff pressure that we’re expecting here in Q4. But the combination of it all gets you to the number that we’re projecting of 5% annualized growth.

Operator: [Operator Instructions] your next question comes from the line of Daniel Tamayo from Raymond James.

Daniel Tamayo: Maybe just one on the fees and expenses. So the 4Q guide pulling out Westfield just for a second was higher than what we were looking for and certainly what the 3Q number was. Just curious if there’s something seasonal, unusual, unique in the fourth quarter? Or maybe if you can kind of give us some indication of what the run rates would look like going into ’26.

James Anderson: Yes, Danny, it’s Jamie. Really, the big impact from the third quarter to the fourth quarter in that — like again, I think you’re looking at just ex-Westfield kind of the legacy First Financial numbers is really coming from Bannockburn. The forecast that we’re getting from them for the fourth quarter is a little higher even than what we had in the strong third quarter. A little bit of bump as well as the Summit related to the operating leases. And then our wealth department, especially on the M&A and the investment banking side, up just a little bit from that division that we have there. So it’s really those 3 areas, primarily though, driven by Bannockburn. And like we have talked before, Dan, I mean, they can — that can bounce around a little bit. So I mean, to kind of talk about that long, long term, we look at that business kind of year-over-year now is growing in that — generally in that 10% range.

Archie Brown: Yes. And Dan, those are all commission-based kind of businesses. So when they do well, you’re going to see more commission paid out, which drives the salary costs.

James Anderson: Yes.

Daniel Tamayo: That’s great. That’s very helpful. And my other question, I guess, on the credit side. So a good quarter from a credit perspective, guiding to similar credit costs. Just curious how long you think those play out? I think in the past, we’ve talked about a little bit higher run rate on the charge-off side. Any read-throughs in the near term past the fourth quarter on credit?

Archie Brown: Yes, Dan, this is Archie. I don’t — I mean, I think it’s kind of steady as we go. We’ve, I think, been saying all year, 25 to 30 basis points, kind of mid-20s seems to be the run rate for us in the current environment. And I think over a period of quarters, that’s what we would expect.

Daniel Tamayo: Understood. Okay. And then lastly, on the capital front, so you got the 2 deals closing here in the near term, take a little bit of a hit to capital. But curious, you’ll still have pretty strong CET1. How you’re thinking about buybacks? You probably think the stock is a little undervalued right now. Once we get past the deals, like if there’s a bogey you’re looking at on the capital side or any color there would be great.

James Anderson: Yes, Dan, this is Jamie. So yes, I think you said it well. What we’ll do here over the next really probably 2 to 3 quarters is let the deals flow in and kind of see where we’re shaking out in terms of capital ratios at that point. I mean we are building TCE relatively and tangible book value relatively quickly at this point. And we will take — so the TCE takes about 120 basis point hit in the — once we close the Westfield deal just because of the all-cash nature of it. And then — so we’ll let the next 2 or 3 quarters kind of play out and then see where we are and see where we’re trading in terms of multiple at that point. If we’re trading anywhere in that 150% of tangible book value or below, we would potentially look at buybacks at that point.

Operator: Your next question comes from the line of Terry McEvoy from Stephens.

Terence McEvoy: From talking to some of the other banks that are in your metro markets in your footprint, kind of surprised with the deposit competition a bit stronger than I would have guessed. And your cost of funds up a few basis points quarter-over-quarter. So can you maybe just talk about deposit competition? And you didn’t have loan growth this quarter. Next quarter, you’re guiding towards that. Does that kind of drive those deposit costs higher as you look to fund that growth?

Archie Brown: Yes, Terry, this is Archie. I’ll start. It was modestly up for the quarter. I mean I would argue it is flattish. And with the rate cut that occurred, we did take some, I think, decisive actions on the deposit side that went into effect really this quarter. So now we have more — of course, more short-term rate cuts coming. But we would expect a reduction in our deposit cost going forward in Q4. I mean it was pretty — did a pretty aggressive cut. And yes, I mean, the market is competitive, but if you look at our current loan-to-deposit ratio, and we felt even with some loan growth, we felt we could take a little bit more aggressive actions. And we’ll look to do more here with more Fed cuts. And then I think one of the things we like about BankFinancial, again, one, they have lower deposit and funding costs than we do. And that market from what we can see, still has a little more rational pricing than what we’re seeing here kind of in Southwest Ohio.

James Anderson: Yes. The other thing, Terry, to keep in mind, I mean, we do have the a little bit higher — some loan growth in the fourth quarter and then going forward. But we don’t think that puts a lot of pressure on our deposit costs because of the liquidity that we get coming in — especially in the BankFinancial deal. If it closes in the first part of ’26. So they already have a relatively low loan-to-deposit ratio, and then we’re selling the multifamily portfolio, which will then create even more liquidity for us to utilize for loan growth or to pay off borrowings or to reinvest.

Terence McEvoy: That’s great. And nice to see the FX trading and the 4Q guide higher at $18 million to $20 million. I just want to make sure that run rate looking out into ’26, do you think that is more consistent of next year? Or is this more of just a couple of strong quarters and next year we will go back to some of your prior comments on the outlook for that revenue line?

Archie Brown: Well, certainly, Q4 would be a peak for them, Terry, if they hit the numbers that are being projected. And as Jamie said, it sort of bounces around. We look at it more on kind of an annual kind of 4-quarter basis rolling even. They will — we’ve owned them now for quite a while. And what we’ve observed is they grow, they may flatten out a little bit, then they hit another growth spurt. But if you think 5% to 10% kind of growth rate I think you’re in the ballpark for what we would expect them to do.

James Anderson: Yes, Terry, this is Jamie. As we get into — as we look out kind of into ’26, I mean, that will — I wouldn’t annualize this fourth quarter number that we’re talking about. So I would look more into ’26 at like a $65 million to $70 million type of a run rate for them.

Operator: Your next question comes from the line of Jon Arfstrom from RBC.

Jon Arfstrom: Jamie, in your prepared comments, you touched on the workforce efficiency efforts. And can you talk a little bit about where you are in that journey? And then when you look at the 2 acquisitions, what kind of opportunities do you see there? Because it seems like you’re going to apply this framework over the top of those 2 deals.

Archie Brown: Yes, Jon, this is Archie. I’ll start. We’re probably 90% of the way through the company, the First Financial legacy company now. So there’s a little bit left in some areas, but it’s probably going to be a couple of quarters more to get a little bit of opportunity out of those areas. So as I think we alluded to in our comments that we think the opportunity to continue to get efficiency comes from the 2 acquisitions. And I think in the Westfield case, we had said around 40% expense reduction from the combination. And we’re — I think we’re well on our way to achieve that, maybe slightly exceed it. BankFinancial was maybe just a little bit less because there’s bigger branch count. But what we had modeled, again, we’re well on our way to exceed that.

And that includes us in both those markets, adding back roles to drive more revenue. Some of the businesses we have that maybe those banks didn’t have, we’re adding the appropriate people to help us grow in those markets. And even with that, we would still achieve the expense that we’ve — reductions that we modeled in those deals.

Jon Arfstrom: Yes. Okay. That makes sense. Yes, some good opportunities there, obviously, for production. And Terry took a couple of my questions on deposits. But Jamie, can you just remind us of the typical seasonal flows on deposits that you see in the fourth quarter?

James Anderson: Yes. So we — just — yes, to remind you and everybody else, we get a seasonal bump in public funds, mainly from Indiana, where property taxes reduced. So we get those in May and November. And so typically, we will get, call it, around $150 million to $200 million kind of extra of deposits in those quarters on average. And then they — a little bit more skewed, I would say, to the second quarter, but call it, $150 million to $200 million in both of those quarters, and then they run out in the subsequent quarter and kind of go back down to the base level. But that’s pretty much like clockwork. I mean it happens pretty much every quarter. And then so that’s what you saw here in the third quarter where those public funds running down by $100 million to $150 million. And then we just replaced those with — sometimes we just replace those with brokered CDs or borrowings.

Operator: And that concludes our question-and-answer session. I will now turn the call back over to Archie Brown for closing comments.

Archie Brown: Thank you, Rob. I want to thank everybody for joining us today. We really feel great about the quarter we had and are excited about fourth quarter and the momentum we’re building for 2026 with the pending acquisitions. We look forward to talking to you again in a quarter. Have a great day and weekend.

Operator: This concludes today’s conference call. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect.