Fifth Third Bancorp

will be a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question during this time, simply press star followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. If you would like to withdraw your question, press star one again. Thank you. I would now like to turn the call over to Matt Carroll, Director of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Good morning, everyone. Welcome to Fifth Third's first quarter 2025 earnings call. This morning, our Chairman, CEO, and President, Tim Spence, and CFO, Brian Preston, will provide an overview of our first quarter results and outlook. Our Chief Credit Officer, Greg Schreck, has also joined the Q&A portion of the call. Please review the cautionary statements in our materials, which can be found in our earnings release and presentation. These materials contain information regarding the use of non-GAAP measures and reconciliations to the GAAP results, as well as forward-looking statements about Fifth Thirds performance. These statements speak only as of April 17, 2025, and Fifth Third undertakes no obligation to update them. Following prepared remarks by Tim and Brian, we will open up the call for questions. With that, let me turn it over to Tim.

Thanks, Matt, and good morning, everyone. At Fifth Third, we believe great banks distinguish themselves not by how they navigate benign environments, but rather by how they navigate uncertain ones. I say this at the start of every investor communication, but it is particularly relevant today. I'm very pleased with our performance this past quarter and confident that we are positioned to deliver stability, profitability, and growth in that order in the many potential scenarios that could play out over the remainder of the year. This morning, we reported earnings per share of 71 cents, or 73 cents, excluding certain items outlined on page two of the release, exceeding consensus estimates. We grew PPNR by 5% year over year, and achieved an adjusted return on equity of 11.2%. We grew tangible book value per share 15% over the prior year, despite the 10-year treasury rate being unchanged. And on a trailing 12-month basis, our return on assets, return on equity, and efficiency ratio remain among the best of our peers. In the quarter, we sustained our positive momentum on loan growth, net interest margins, net charge-off rate, and operating leverage. Total loans grew 3% year-over-year, driven by strong middle market C&I production, a pickup in leasing activity, and balanced growth across consumer-secured lending categories. Our charge-off rate was stable following sequential improvement over the second half of last year. Core deposits were stable, even with our continued progress on deposit costs, supported by 2% total household growth and 5% growth in the southeast. NII grew faster than our balance sheet grew, at 4% over the prior year, as net interest margins expanded for the fifth consecutive quarter. But despite market-related impacts to our capital markets business, adjusted fees, excluding securities gains and losses, were up 1% versus the prior year. Commercial payments grew 6%, driven by new lines in our managed services offerings, and wealth and asset management revenue grew 7%, supported by 10% growth in AUM. Continued progress on our value streams and disciplined expense management held expenses flat versus the prior year, and we again delivered positive operating leverage. We are pleased that our first quarter results reflected the strength of our franchise, but today we are focused on what is in front of us as opposed to what is behind. In my annual letter to shareholders in February, I wrote that the global economy is a complex adaptive system, and the complex systems react to change in unexpected ways. Despite our best efforts to understand the implications, today we cannot predict what the final tariff policies will look like, much less what the second-order effects on economic activity, fiscal policy, and monetary policy will be. What we can do is to ensure that our business mix is more naturally resilient, run our balance sheet defensively, and maintain optionality so that we can react quickly as conditions change. If C&I loan demand softens in the second half of the year, We have more avenues than most to manage our balance sheet. Our diverse national loan origination platforms give us flexibility on how and where to generate loan growth, and our multi-year investments in southeast branches and growth in commercial payments will continue to produce granular operational deposit funding. We believe credit concentration limits boost resiliency and the quality of client selection, and as a result, we are well diversified across asset classes, industries, and regions. We are clear-eyed about risks when they emerge and have been consistent about moving proactively to ensure charge-offs are well-reserved before they materialize. At 2.7%, our ACL coverage ratio is among the highest of all our peers. On fee income, our focus on diversification and recurring versus transactional revenue sources should help to mitigate the potential for continued capital markets disruptions. Five different fee categories each contributed more than 10% of total fee income in the first quarter. Finally, we manage our business day-to-day in a fashion that maximizes optionality. We define multiple paths to achieving our revenue targets, model a broad range of scenarios including low growth, stagflation, and recession scenarios, and weigh our options to deliver sustainable profitability. We always plan to keep a tight lid on expenses because it is easier to invest more in a stronger than expected environment than it is to cut in a weaker-than-expected environment. Brian will provide more detail on our outlook for the remainder of the year, but I would like to highlight a few points. First, we expect to achieve record NII within our existing guidance range, even if there are no rate cuts and no further loan growth. Second, we can deliver full-year positive operating leverage even if the capital markets do not recover, given the expense levers we have at our disposal. If the forward curve is realized, we expect to grow tangible book value per share by 10% for the full year from AOCI accretion alone, in addition to the growth we will generate from earnings. Last, our capital priorities continue to be funding organic growth, paying a strong dividend, and share purchases in that order. Before I hand it over to Brian, I want to say thank you to our employees for all you do and for your dedication to our clients. Your commitment to getting 1% better every day is the reason Fifth Third was recently recognized by Atmosphere as one of the world's most ethical companies, by Fortune as one of America's most innovative companies, by Euromoney as the best U.S. private bank, and by J.D. Power as number one in retail customer satisfaction in Florida for the second consecutive year. I love being part of your team. With that, Brian will provide more detail in the quarter and our outlook.