First Hawaiian, Inc.

If your question has been answered and you wish to remove yourself from the queue, simply press star 1-1 again. As a reminder, today's program is being recorded. And now I'd like to introduce your host for today's program, Jamie Moses, CFO. Please go ahead, sir.

Thank you, Jonathan, and thank you, everyone, for joining us as we review our financial results for the first quarter of 2025. With me today are Bob Harrison, Chairman, President, and CEO, and Lee Nakamura, our Chief Risk Officer. We have prepared a slide presentation that we will refer to in our remarks today. The presentation is available for downloading and viewing on our website at fhb.com in the investor relations section. During today's call, we will be making forward-looking statements, so please refer to slide one for our safe harbor statement. We may also discuss certain non-GAAP financial measures. The appendix to this presentation contains reconciliations of these non-GAAP financial measurements to the most directly comparable GAAP measurements. And now I'll turn the call over to Bob.

Hello, everyone. I'll start by giving a quick overview of the local economy. Overall, Hawaii economy remains stable, but uncertainty is increasing due to recent weakness around international rivals and the lack of clarity about consumer confidence. Statewide seasonally adjusted unemployment rate remained stable in February at 3% compared to the national unemployment rate of 4.1%. Through February, total visitor arrivals were up 1% and spending was up 4.5% compared to 2024 levels. Maui has seen the largest increases in arrivals and spend among all the islands. Also, the housing market remains stable. Turning to slide two, we continue to perform well in the first quarter. Net interest income increased versus the prior quarter. Non-interest income was stable. and expenses remained well controlled. Declining deposit costs and the fourth quarter investment portfolio restructuring helped drive a five basis point increase in NIM. And then finally, credit quality remained excellent and we added to the reserve due to increased macroeconomic uncertainty. Turning to slide three, the balance sheet remained solid and we were well positioned to support our customers. We continue to be well capitalized with ample liquidity. During the first quarter, we repurchased about 974,000 shares at a total cost of 25 million. And we have $75 million of remaining authorization under the approved 2025 stock repurchase plan. Turning to slide four, total loans declined $115 million or 0.8% from the prior quarter The decline was primarily due to commercial real estate loans, where we experienced both scheduled and early payoffs and a few large credits. Growth within the CNI portfolio was partially offset by the normal fluctuations in dealer flooring, which declined by $28 million. Now I'll turn it over to Jamie.

Thanks, Bob. Turning to slide five, while total deposits declined slightly in the first quarter, we were pleased with the underlying performance of the retail and commercial deposit basis. Retail deposits increased $105 million in the quarter, while commercial deposits more than offset that, falling by $167 million. The decline in the commercial book was largely due to normal fluctuations in a few of our larger accounts, but were not reflective of any larger underlying trends. Our total cost of deposits fell by 11 basis points as the benefit from the Q4 rate cuts was fully priced in, as well as the repricing trends from approximately $1.4 billion of CDs in the first quarter. our non-interest-bearing deposit ratio remained an enviable 34%. On slide 6, we see how the deposit performance benefited net interest income and the margin in the quarter. Net interest income was $160.5 million, $1.8 million higher than the prior quarter. The increased NIM in the first quarter was a result of those lower deposit costs and the benefit from the Q4 investment portfolio restructuring, which taken together offset some of the effects of the decline in the yield of our floating rate loan portfolio. Looking ahead, the underlying balance sheet dynamics driving the NIM remain intact, and we anticipate that the NIM in the second quarter will increase a few basis points to 310. I want to also point out that given the current macro environment, the level of uncertainty around our outlook has increased. Turning to slide seven, Non-interest income was $50.5 million, and non-interest expenses were $123.6 million. There were no significant non-recurring, non-interest income, or expense items in the quarter, and our full year outlook for both of those lines remains the same. And now I'll turn it over to Lee.

Thank you, Jamie. Moving to slide eight, the bank maintained its strong credit performance and healthy credit metrics in the first quarter. Credit risk remains low, stable, and well within our expectations. We're not observing any broad signs of weakness across either the consumer or the commercial books. Classified assets decreased by $3 million due primarily to pay downs. Year-to-date net charge-offs were $3.8 million, and our annual year-to-date net charge-off rate was 11 basis points. Non-performing assets and 90-day past due loans came in at 17 basis points at the end of the first quarter, down two basis points from the prior quarter. Moving to slide nine, we show our first quarter allowance for credit losses broken out by disclosure segments. The bank recorded a $10.5 million provision in the first quarter. The asset ACL increased by $6.2 million to $166.6 million, with coverage increasing six basis points to 117 basis points of total loans and leases. The reserve bill reflects the more pessimistic forecasts available to the economic forecasting component of our CECL model. We believe that we are conservatively reserved and ready for a wide range of outcomes. Let me now turn the call back to Bob for any closing remarks.

Thank you, Lee. Thank you, Jamie. Now we'd be happy to answer any questions.

Certainly. And as a reminder, if you have a question, please press star 11 on your telephone. Our first question comes from the line of David Feaster from Raymond James. Your question, please.

Hi. Good morning, everybody. Hey, Dave. I wanted to start on, on the loan side, you know, appreciate some of the commentary on, on in the release and what's, what you alluded to Bob about, you know, just the strength of the economy. I'm curious, maybe starting with the pulse of your clients, like how's, how is the pulse of your, obviously there's a ton of uncertainty, but just curious again about the pulse of the economy. How's the pipeline shaping up expectations for pull through and, And just, you know, again, how much of that decline, you know, in CRE this quarter was, you know, driven by that weaker demand or how much was it payoffs and paydowns? Big question, sorry.

No, no, that's a great question, Dave. Thank you. Let me start on that. And if Jamie or Lee have comments, we'll let them certainly join in. You know, actually, average loans for the quarter was up over Q4. So it really was just a few things during the quarter. We participated in a loan that we originated in Q4. We participated out in Q1, just kind of normal stuff. The dealer paydowns is very typical to see a buildup at your end, and then some of that come off in Q1. And then we had some other paydowns. So, you know, there wasn't anything in Q1 that we thought was unusual. We do think that we are seeing the pipeline being pretty strong out there, but there's more uncertainty in the market. I mean, you heard that with Lee's comments, the modeling is modeling in a little bit more uncertainty. So we think it's fine, but we certainly can't tell what's going to happen in the back half of the year. We think there's opportunity there, everything else being normal.

Okay. Okay. That's helpful. And then maybe touching on the other side of the balance sheet on the deposit side, you guys have had a lot of success repricing deposits and doing some remixing. Obviously, there's some seasonality this quarter. I'm just kind of curious, maybe the competitive landscape on the deposit front, how much leverage is there left for you to continue to reduce deposit costs? Yeah, just kind of curious what you're seeing there.

Yeah. Hey, Dave, it's Jamie. I guess what I think is that when we see rates continue to decline, we'll still have opportunities to also bring down those deposit costs as well. We've had a pretty strong beta from a downturn perspective. And I think that that beta begins to decelerate, but still exists. It's tough to go much lower than 143 from this point versus being at 2% or something like that. There's a lot more room from that perspective. Also, we pride ourselves on having full relationships and really grabbing those operating accounts from folks. Having more DDA also limits our ability to to reduce rates even further. But, you know, I don't think we want to apologize for that. I think that, you know, we have pretty good deposit performance, and we're happy with how that's working out for us.

Absolutely. Sorry, this is Bob. The only thing I would add to that is, you know, we're very pleased with the increase in the retail deposits of $100 million. That really shows that we're out there, the teams are out there serving their customers and growing their relationships. There's, you know, literally a handful of large commercial accounts that They're all still great customers of ours. It's just the fluctuations at the end of the quarter went negative instead of staying stable or going up. So, you know, we weren't concerned about the drop on the commercial side either.

Absolutely. So if I'm hearing you, Jamie, exclusive of rate cuts, not a ton of, you know, room to wood to chop, if you will, on the deposit cost side.

Yeah, I think that's right. There's some ability still related to CD repricings that we have in the second and third quarters. But apart from that, I don't think there's a whole lot for us to really be able to do there.

Can you remind us what those roll-off rates are and where you're pricing new CDs?

Yeah, so it fluctuates a little bit, but we're probably getting 20 to 30 basis points in total spread on that repricing.

Okay, awesome. And then just the last question I wanted to touch on was on the expense side. You know, you came in better than expected here in the first quarter. You know, seasonally, you know, there's some headwinds, right, with FICA bonuses, raises, and all that kind of stuff, but still reiterated the guidance at 510. Could you just maybe... touch on the trajectory over the course of the year, where you're investing in, um, and maybe some, some, you know, projects or just kind of how you think about expenses this year.

Yeah. I mean, I think we're always looking to invest in the business and, and into our, into our people, right. That's an important component to us, maybe the most important component, um, uh, for us. So, you know, I think that, um, I think that we just, you know, there was some slowness, uh, in the, in the first quarter and expenses. And, um, you know, we expect that that should, um, That should ramp up over the year, but committed to staying within the guidance that we gave. I think to the extent that there are other opportunities, there's some projects and things that we might put in the queue that can generate ROIs for us in the coming years, but we want to make sure that the outlook, we're a little more certain of the outlook before we make those kinds of investments. it's really a combination of those things, you know, going to keep the guidance the same for now. And, you know, there are obviously possible levers, you know, depending on what happens out in the world.

Yeah. And Bob, maybe just to add a little bit to that, you know, as we've talked about in the past, we kind of did the big tech spend over the last several years. So there's always projects that we're working on and certainly in data and analytics and other areas that, you know, we're trying to provide value to the, The line folks have better do their jobs and take care of their customers, but it's not on the scale that we've had in previous years, which has allowed us to kind of keep our guidance where it is and work, you know, maybe one quarter a little below, but we're still keeping that guidance.

Okay. That's helpful. Thanks, everybody. Thank you. And our next question comes from the line of Jared Shaw from Barclays. Your question, please. Hey, good morning.

When I'm looking at the growth in the allowance, and you mentioned the qualitative overlay there, if we assume that UHERO catches up to the expected slower visitor arrivals, do you just feel like that qualitative overlay is front-loading some of that, or could we expect to see the ACL ratio go up if the UHERO deteriorates?

So it's not the qualitative overlays, the quantitative portion of the model that generated that increase. So we do put in more than just you hero. It's a multiple of factors. So it's it's hard to say what what will happen with the coverage ratio.

One of the things that actually happened during the quarter was this Bob that changed a little bit as we saw better performance Maui, and so now we're reducing some of that qualitative overlay and, you know, other things are kicking in to Lee's point. So, you know, there's a lot of different factors in that one.

Okay. All right. That's great. Thanks. And then could you just sort of walk through some of your thoughts around the floor plan businesses' exposure to tariffs? And, you know, if we do end up seeing significantly higher pricing for imported cars? How does that impact the dynamic of floor plan, either balances or credit or growth there?

Great question. We ended the quarter of floor plan at $661 million, so that's certainly up off the base and well below the all-time highs, but business is different now. I guess I would start with the dealers and certainly our dealers are very good business people, and we saw this during COVID, that they were able to really pivot and move from selling new cars to selling used to doing service and adjusting their cost structure. So from a credit perspective, never say never. We don't have any concerns out there on the credit. Regarding the balances, that's just going to be a factor of what's happening with tariffs should they be put in place. What we saw and what we're hearing and reading, like everybody else, is that there was some pull through at the end of the third quarter and maybe into April of people maybe doing purchases in anticipation of that and wanting to get the car they wanted now. There's still a lot of uncertainty if the tariffs will stick, on which countries they'll be applied, is it to the subsidiary parts or not, how that works. The other factor we haven't heard anything about is what manufacturers will do to support the dealer network. You know, that's just an unknown. Will they be there to support the dealer network? Will they pass through the cost? All these things are going to become clearer over the next weeks and months. So we're very comfortable with credit. They're good operators. We'll just have to, on the balances side, we'll just have to see how that plays out, to be candid.

Great.

Thanks a lot, Bob. Thank you. And our next question comes from the line of Kelly Mata from KBW. Your question, please.

Hey, good morning. Thanks for the question, guys. I think maybe turning to deposits, can you remind us the seasonal trends there and what we should be expecting in the upcoming quarter given whatever line of sight you have into that? Thanks.

Sure. Thanks, Kelly. It's Jamie. So, you know, as we would expect, there should be some tax implications, you know, in the first quarter as folks, you know, pay taxes and so draw down some balances. What we've seen in the past is that really the back half of the year is where the deposits start to build. What's different is that what's different for us this quarter and what makes it a little bit tough to sort of prognosticate at the moment is is that we did see that really good increase in retail deposits in the first quarter. And so, you know, it really kind of just depends on how those sort of trends play out relative to the commercial deposits, right? So, you know, we mentioned earlier we have some accounts that have large fluctuations on a normal basis. And so kind of depending on where the quarter ends, you know, they're either up or down. but you know I think in general we're seeing good net account growth we're seeing we're seeing good customer growth and you know it's a that's a credit to our retail teams they're doing a great job out there in the streets just you know making connections and servicing our customers you know so you know I think that's just a just part of what we do and you know we're generally pretty happy with where that's going so and the only

Kelly, it's Bob. The only thing I would add to that, similar to the loans, the average deposits for the quarter were up over the fourth quarter. So this is kind of normal fluctuation and mix. What that tells us about the future is a little less clear given the uncertainty and the market conditions, etc. But the economy is still growing. Great production by the retail teams, to Jamie's point.

Got it. That's helpful. And I guess maybe the last question from me, it looks like average cash balances were elevated a bit in the quarter. Tying that in with your commentary just now about deposits potentially picking up in the back half with seasonal trends, would you expect the overall size of the balance sheet to grow commensurate with that, or are we still funding some of the potential growth with cash flows off the securities book? Just trying to round out to get a good sense of the size of the balance sheet. Thanks.

Yeah, that's great, Kelly. Good question. I think the answer is that you actually hit it on the head, which is that to the extent that our deposits are growing, the size of our balance sheet will grow along with that. There's a chance that maybe those cash balances were a little bit elevated And so the size of the balance sheet may be slightly smaller, but sort of the efficiency of that balance sheet should be better. So in terms of NII, if that's what you're thinking about, I think that's probably exactly the right way to think about it.

Great. Thank you so much for the color today. I will step back. Nice quarter, guys.

Thanks, Kelly. Thank you. And our next question comes from the line of Anthony Elion from JP Morgan. Your question, please.

Hi, everyone. Just following up on loan growth, do you think second quarter could be a growth quarter for total loans? And then what are you expecting on a full year basis, still that low to mid single digits range?

Morning, Tony. This is Bob. So I guess, well, first of all, I'll start with the full year. We haven't changed our guidance. There's uncertainty out there, but we still think there's an opportunity to get to low to mid single digits, depending on what happens in the economy Again, subject to tariffs of the earlier discussion on any impact on the auto dealers, et cetera, but we're still optimistic on that. As far as Q2, it's a little harder to see. There's a number of loans in the pipeline. One thing that uncertainty does create is probably fewer of the construction loans being refinanced, the multifamily primarily, given the takeouts and different markets, CNBS, et cetera. is a little more difficult right now that they might be more likely to move into mini-perms. So these are all things we're watching and talking about and talking with our borrowers about. But there is a number of deals in the pipeline. We just hard to pin which quarter we think the growth will be in throughout the rest of the year.

Okay. And then my follow-up, you provided a good color on the dealer floor plan loan portfolio. I'm not concerned about the credits there. Are there any other loan portfolios more broadly you're maybe paying a closer attention to, given the heightened exposure to tariffs, manufacturing, supply chain, anything like that? Anything proactive you're doing now on those portfolios? Thank you.

Yeah, great question. You know, the kind of broad base of CNI is something we're also staying close to our customers on. CNI X Dealer, which we talked about earlier. You know, it's just a variety of businesses in there and the impact of what's happening with not so much tariffs writ large and any, you know, we don't have any industries that are directly impacted, but, you know, a lot of small businesses are obviously going to be impacted by higher costs associated with goods that are imported from somewhere else. And so that's something that the credit teams on the line are spending a lot of time talking about just to stay close to those customers. Nothing has surfaced yet to these earlier comments. That is something, just a heightened awareness for us.

And Tony, just to add just quickly to that, the credit and risk teams, they feel really strongly that the impacts of tariffs and other disruptions is sort of really customer dependent, not necessarily by portfolio. And so this is where it's really helpful that we have such strong relationships with our borrowers that we're able to really be tight with them and really understand their businesses so that we can really understand what those impacts are and work through and with them throughout the course of time.

Thank you.

Thank you. And our next question comes from the line of Andrew Terrell from Stevens. Your question, please.

Hey, good morning. Jamie, if I could just start on the margin. Would you happen to have this spot deposit cost at the end of the period and then maybe the margin in the month of March?

Yeah, spot deposit cost was 141, and the margin in March was 310.

Got it. Okay.

So embedded in our forecast, right, is that there's going to be a rate cut in June. And so that 310 guidance that I'm giving is, you know, inclusive of that as well. And so that's why maybe, you know, it seems like it's not expanding off of March. That's the reason is the rate cut in the forecast would offset that.

Got it. Okay. Yep. That was exactly where I was going next. I appreciate it. Yes. And then could you just remind us on the buyback? You know, I saw you guys were active this quarter, this past quarter. There's obviously a bit of volatility in the market. Just, you know, expectations around the buyback moving forward and specifically, you know, any interest in maybe accelerating the pace of buyback given some of the volatility we've seen?

Yeah, I mean, you know, I think that there's definitely, you know, interest when the price is lower, right? Yeah. But I think the way to think about it and the way that we're trying to be real careful and think about it is that this is a program that we have in place and we're trying to do things very programmatically. That doesn't necessarily mean that there won't be acceleration of the buyback when we see opportunities, but just broad-based when we're thinking about it, we're thinking about this not trying to time markets and things like that. We're really trying to just put this program in place to return capital to the shareholders. So it's possible, but I would think that it's more likely the 25 per quarter kind of thing is where we're more looking at.

Understood. Okay. Thanks for taking the questions.

Yep. Thank you. And our next question comes from the line of Andrew Leach from Piper Sandler. Your question, please.

Thanks. Just a quick question to follow up on the margin commentary here. So you're going to be 310 for the second quarter. How quickly can you offset any rate cuts? So if we look out further into the year, can you offset the Can you offset the rate cut in the third quarter and keep the margin flat at 310, or is there going to be an initial drop? I know you have a fair amount of asset repricing that's still going to have a positive differential. So do you think you can hold the margin flat, or do you think the margin will be down a quarter?

I think that's going to be dependent upon our loan growth. And so if we're able to grow loans at a very good clip, then there's a chance that we can fully offset that in a quarter. If not, then maybe you'll see a small decline, but then you should continue to see a general march higher when those repricing dynamics continue. So, um, you know, it's, it's, it's tough to say without, you know, without knowing, um, all the, all the moving parts, uh, around that, but, you know, there, as we said, there's opportunities in, in the, in our rate sensitive deposits. And then we have the CDs that also reprice, um, in the, in the second and third quarter. So, you know, I, I feel confident that we, once we hit a, we hit a rate cut, we reprice things. It's, it's obviously lower. but then we have the ability to then drive it higher. So those fundamentals still remain intact. Got it. Thank you. And then just a follow-up question. What's the tax rate we should be using here? 23%, we think, is a good number for the year. Got it.

That's all my questions. You've covered everything else.

Thanks.

Thank you. And our next question comes from the line of Timur Braziler from U.S. Wells Fargo. Your question, please.

Hi, good morning. Starting big picture for me, just looking at tariffs, I guess, where could tariffs potentially be more multiplicative for Hawaii, given that there's just more stops along the way for things to reach the island? And then, Bob, maybe you can help frame the risk both from the tariffs and what slowing visitor arrivals could portend for the island economy.

Yeah, Tim, good morning. I guess for broadly from tariffs, Jamie touched on it a bit earlier. We don't have businesses that are doing manufacturing that you're seeing things come in. I guess one of the concerns would be, and we didn't touch on this yet, so very good question, would be in construction, are you seeing higher raw material costs, or where could that take us? No projects have been canceled by any of our customers. The developers are, of course, working closely with contractors to make sure that the prices are solid before they launch into a project. So that's more of a look forward opportunity that creates a little bit of uncertainty around that. Given the importance and strength of construction in Hawaii, that's maybe the area that you'd look to, but we have some pretty conservative contractors too. I know of one that you know, whenever they bid a job and they get awarded, they buy all the materials right then to make sure they lock in their costs. So it really depends on the customer and the situation. But clearly, if there's a dramatic increase in construction material costs that are, some of which are important, that could in the future affect construction. You know, that's really the only one. The other point that Jamie made that, you know, that kind of ties into various CNI loans of customers, you know, we're just staying close to people on that. Maybe the last thing is, as it affects tourism, I think was the last part of your question. You know, there's stories of, we haven't seen any evidence of foreign visitors being less willing or more reluctant to travel to the US, which could include Hawaii as well. But we're seeing the tiny bit in the numbers through February, but You know, the numbers haven't come out yet for March, and, you know, future bookings is anybody's guess. So that's something we're watching closely and staying in close contact with our hospitality customers. Does that answer your question?

It does, yeah. Thank you. And then I guess just a second for me, looking at the reserve build this quarter, It seems like much of that was driven by the consumer portfolio. I'm just wondering kind of just some broader thoughts around your consumer exposure and just the thought process of building that reserve over these last couple of quarters.

So it was, again, driven by the economic forecasting model and then how it gets allocated out. I know what slide you're looking at, but how it gets allocated out is then a different methodology. Overall, consumer, we haven't seen the kind of deterioration that one might have expected based on the forecasts that are being fed into the model. So it's performing well for us still. We are concerned about it because as your questions indicate, Hawaii is vulnerable to tariffs decreases in federal spending, et cetera. But so far, you know, consumers held up, even though we're, again, another thing to watch very closely. So many different things to watch closely now.

Yeah, and maybe it's worth mentioning, thanks, Lee, maybe it's worth mentioning on the federal spending. The Defense Secretary stopped by on his way to Asia, made a very strong statement that, you know, Indo-Pacific Command is going to remain fully funded given its mission here in the Pacific and all the way through India. That doesn't mean there won't be impacts. There's a number of other things the federal government is looking to reduce costs on that will affect Hawaii, but kind of the largest driver in of itself, which is Department of Defense and the Pacific Command, appears to be at least on most recent statements as of whatever it was a week, 10 days ago, that won't be subject to any cuts.

Great. Thanks for that.

Thank you. This does conclude the question and answer session of today's program. I'd like to hand the program back to Jamie Moses, CFO, for any further remarks.

Okay. Thanks, Jonathan. We appreciate your interest in First Hawaiian, and please feel free to contact me or Kevin Hasayama, our Investor Relations Director, if you have any additional questions. Thanks again for joining us, and have a great rest of your week.

Thank you, ladies and gentlemen, for your participation in today's conference. This does conclude the program. You may now disconnect. Good day.