Hope Bancorp, Inc.

Good day and welcome to the Hope Bancorp 2025 Second Quarter Earnings Conference Call. All participants will be in listen-only mode. Should you need assistance, please signal a conference specialist by pressing star then zero on your telephone keypad. After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. To ask a question, you may press star then one on your telephone keypad. To withdraw your question, please press star then two. Please note this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Angie Yang, Director of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Drew. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us for the Hope Bank Corp 2025 Second Quarter Investor Conference Call. As usual, we will be using a slide presentation to accompany our discussion this morning, which is available in the Presentations page of our Investor Relations website. Beginning on slide two, let me start with a brief statement regarding forward looking remarks. The call today contains forward looking projections regarding the future financial performance of the company and future events. Forward looking statements are not guarantees of future performance. Actual outcomes and results may differ materially. Hope Bancorp assumes no obligation to revise any forward looking projections that may be made on today's call. In addition, Some of the information referenced on this call today are non-GAAP financial measures. For a more detailed description of the risk factors and a reconciliation of GAAP to non-GAAP financial measures, please refer to the company's filings with the SEC, as well as the Safe Harbor Statement in our press release issued this morning. Now, we have allotted one hour for this call. Presenting from the management side today will be Kevin Kim, Hope Benkortz, Chairman, President, and CEO, and Juliana Beliska, our Chief Financial Officer. Peter Koh, our Chief Operating Officer, is also here with us as usual and will be available for the Q&A session. With that, let me turn the call over to Kevin Kim. Kevin?

Thank you, Angie. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. Let's begin on slide three with a brief overview of the quarter. The second quarter of 2025 was a milestone quarter for Hope Bancorp as we completed the acquisition of Territorial Bancorp, entering the strategically important market of Hawaii. We are excited about the opportunities that this presents. We also repositioned a portion of our legacy securities portfolio to enhance our interest income. Accordingly, we believe Net income excluding notable items is more indicative of our fundamental performance this quarter. Net income for the 2025 second quarter excluding notable items totaled $24.5 million, up 7% from $22.9 million excluding notable items in the preceding first quarter. Earnings per diluted share Excluding notable items were 19 cents for both quarters as we issued 9 million shares with the territorial transaction. As a result of the one-time loss incurred from selling lower yielding legacy securities and from merger related items, together with a one-time impact from a change in California's state tax apportionment law, we reported a net loss of $27.9 million for the second quarter. Pre-tax, pre-provision net revenue, excluding notable items, grew to $41.2 million in the second quarter of 2025, up 17% from $35.2 million in the 2025 first quarter. This reflected the impact of the territorial acquisition, legacy loan growth, improvement in the cost of deposits, and core fee income growth. Moving on to slide four, all our capital ratios remain well above the requirements for well-capitalized financial institutions after the close of the territorial acquisition. Our strong capital levels and ample liquidity provide us a healthy cushion with which to navigate various macroeconomic scenarios and support prudent balance sheet growth. Our Board of Directors declared a quarterly common stock dividend of 14 cents per share payable on August 15th to stockholders of record as of August 1, 2025. Continuing to slide five, strengthening our deposit franchise remains a key priority. At June 30, 2025, our total deposits, with the completion of the territorial acquisition, grew to $15.9 billion, an increase of 10% from the end of the prior quarter. The addition of territorial low-cost deposits drove a substantial improvement in our cost of deposits. In addition, the ongoing maturity and renewal of CDs to lower rates will contribute to the improvement in the cost of funds. Our average cost of interest-bearing deposits declined 37 basis points, quarter-over-quarter, and our average cost of total deposits decreased by 22 basis points, quarter-over-quarter. Similar to past quarters, we continued to reduce our broker deposits exposure, which decreased by $183 million, or 19% quarter-over-quarter. Overall, the broker deposits ratio declined to 5 percent of total deposits at June 30, 2025, down from 7 percent as of March 31, 2025, and 9 percent as of June 30, 2024. Moving on to slide six, at June 30, 2025, loans receivable of $14.4 billion were up 8 percent from the end of the prior quarter, reflecting the addition of territorial loan portfolio, as well as strengthening organic loan production. Organic loan production increased 57 percent from the first quarter levels with a well-diversified mix of originations across all our areas of lending. Stronger production has translated into modest net growth in our legacy portfolio, similar to past quarters, we saw robust net growth from Bank of Hope's residential mortgage team. In addition, commercial real estate loans were up slightly quarter of a quarter. Late in the quarter, we experienced some short-term pay downs in certain commercial lines of credit, and those balances have largely rebuilt immediately after the quarter end. Overall, with the addition of Territorial, our loan portfolio diversification has improved notably. Residential mortgage and other loans represented 16% of our total loans as of June 30, 2025, up from 9% at March 31, 2025. On slides seven and eight, we provide more details on our commercial real estate loans, which are well diversified by property type and granular in size. The loan-to-values remain low, with a weighted average of approximately 46% at June 30, 2025, and the profile of our commercial real estate portfolio has not changed meaningfully. Asset quality remains stable. With that, I will ask Juliana to provide additional details on our financial performance for the second quarter. Juliana?

Thank you, Kevin, and good morning, everyone. Before I begin my remarks, let me just make a quick clarification to an earlier comment. We issued 7 million shares with the territorial Bancorp transaction. And now, beginning on slide nine, our net interest income totaled $118 million for the second quarter of 2025, an increase of 17% from the prior quarter. This reflects the positive impact of the territorial acquisition and organic loan growth as well as an expansion in our net interest margin. On the bottom left quadrant of this slide, you can see the 2025 second quarter pre-tax acquisition accounting adjustments associated with territorial transactions. We will continue to recognize such adjustments on a quarterly basis through the amortization periods, as noted in the table. Accretion income from territorial loans was $4 million in the second quarter. Accretion income is expected to become a recurring stable component of our interest income due to the long dated nature of territorial loans. The amortization period of this portfolio is currently estimated to be 12 years. I will point out that the prepayment rate on this portfolio is slower than what was initially estimated at merger close, in part due to change forward interest rate curve expectations. For 2025, we are now expecting to recognize approximately $12 million of loan accretion income at approximately $4 million per quarter compared with $14 million anticipated initially for 2025. In June, we sold a portion of our legacy investment securities available for sale with a fair value of $418 million and an aggregate weighted average book yield of 2.33%. The net proceeds from the sale were redeployed to purchase higher yielding securities with an aggregate average market yield of 5.42% at the time of purchase. All else equal, the impact of this repositioning is expected to contribute approximately $12 million per year to interest income. Overall, our net interest margin increased by 15 basis points quarter over quarter to 2.69% for the second quarter of 2025. On slide 10, we show you the quarterly trends in our average loan and deposit balances and our weighted average yields and costs. On to slide 11. Let's look at our non-interest income. Included in non-interest income is a $39 million net loss on the investment securities repositioning that I just discussed, which we consider a notable item. Excluding notable items, the trajectory in our non-interest income has been a highlight over the last year. Second quarter 2025 non-interest income of $15.9 million, excluding the notable loss, was up 44% year over year. Service fees on deposit accounts have continued to grow quarter over quarter. Swap fee income increased year over year by $1 million and year over year, excuse me, customer swap fee income increased quarter over quarter by $1 million and year over year by $1.6 million, reflecting improved customer demand. I will also note that first quarter 2025 other income included a favorable valuation mark of $1.7 million related to the sale of non-offensive SBA loans, and this did not recur in the second quarter. In the second quarter, we sold $67 million of SBA loans and recognized net gains on sale of $4 million. This compares with sales of $50 million in the first quarter and $3.1 million of net gains on sale. Some sales that were initially planned for the first quarter moved into the second quarter, so we look at this result on a first-half basis in aggregate. Moving on to non-interest expense in slide 12. Our non-interest expense totaled $109.5 million in the second quarter, including notable items, which largely comprised one-time merger-related costs. Excluding notable items, non-interest expense was $92 million in the 2025 second quarter, which compared with $81 million in the first quarter, also excluding notable items. The quarter-over-quarter increase generally reflected the addition of the territorial operations to our organization. Our efficiency ratio, excluding notable items, improved quarter-over-quarter to 69.1%, compared with 69.8% for the first quarter of 2025. I will also mention a notable tax item this quarter. On June 27, 2025, California's state tax apportionment law changed. Consequently, the one-time remeasurement of our deferred tax asset cost us $4.9 million this quarter, which we include in notable items. On an ongoing basis, this tax law change will lower our company's effective tax rate by approximately 1%. Now, moving on to slide 13. I will review our asset quality. Our allowance coverage of loans was 1.04% as of June 30, 2025, compared with 1.11% as of March 31st. The change in the coverage ratio primarily reflected the addition of the loans acquired from Territorial, which have a lower reserve requirement due to the lower credit risk profile of residential mortgage loans. Criticized loans declined by $34 million, or 8%, quarter over quarter, to $415 million on June 30, 2025. Within that, special mention loans decreased by $47 million, or 26%. As a percentage of total loans, Our criticized loan ratio was 2.87% at June 30th, down from 3.36% at March 31st, 2025. Non-performing assets as of June 30th total $113 million, representing 61 basis points of total assets, up from 49 basis points of assets as of March 31st. This fluctuation is largely driven by one commercial real estate loan, which is well secured by collateral property in a prime location. Net charge-offs totaled $12 million, or 33 basis points of average loans, for the second quarter on an annualized basis, compared with $8 million, or annualized 25 basis points of average loans in the first quarter. The 2025 second quarter provision for credit losses was $15 million and included merger-related provision for credit losses of $4.5 million, comprising $3.9 million of day one provision for territorial loans at acquisition close, and $600,000 net write-off related to the exit of HOPE's credit card portfolio. These items we consider as notable. With the acquisition, HOPE is adopting Territorial's white label credit card program. Excluding notable items, the second quarter provision for credit losses of $10.5 million compared with $5 million in the first quarter, reflecting second quarter net charge-offs, as well as the quarter-over-quarter increase in the allowance for unfunded loan commitments. With that, let me turn the call back to Kevin.

Thank you, Juliana. Moving on to the outlook on slide 14, we continue to expect 2025 loan growth at a high single-digit percentage rate. Drivers in the second half of the year include continued improved frontline productivity, building on trends from the second quarter, as well as the impact of frontline hiring that we are continuing to make. In our outlook, we customarily use the forward interest rate curve, which currently assumes Fed Funds' target rate cuts in October and December of 2025. A quarter ago, cuts were expected in June, September, and December. All else equal, higher for longer interest rates negatively impact our net interest income. Accordingly, in our outlook, We continue to expect net interest income growth in the high single-digit percentage range for 2025. The negative impact of fewer FED funds rate cuts on our net interest income and the updated slightly lower amount of loan accretion income expected to be recognized in 2025 will be offset by the incremental increase in interest income from the legacy investment portfolio repositioning that we executed in June. We are increasing our year-over-year fee income growth expectations to be in the high 20s percentage range for 2025 based on the year-to-date momentum across various fee business lines. This excludes notable items. Our outlook for non-interest expenses excluding notable items is unchanged at low double digit percentage growth year over year. Lastly, we anticipate an effective tax rate of approximately 14% in both the third quarter and the fourth quarter. This reflects the California state tax apportionment law change and the impact and timing of the tax credit investments we are making. With that, Drew, please open up the call for questions.

Yes, sir. We will now begin the question and answer session. To ask a question, you may press star then 1 on your telephone keypad. If you are using a speakerphone, please pick up your handset before pressing the keys. If at any time your question has been addressed and you would like to withdraw your question, please press star then 2. at this time we will pause momentarily to assemble our roster the first question comes from matthew clark with piper sandler please go ahead hey good morning morning um on your on your fee income guide um i think looks like you're on pace to do roughly 63 million

for the year. Sorry, I'm getting some feedback. 63 million for the year. I know it sounds like SBA was a little heavy with a delay in sales in 2Q, but anything else going on in the second half within fee income that we should think about?

Yeah, I think for second half fee income... Hi, Matthew. The SBA, basically, it's a question of timing. You take a look at one first quarter and second quarter and average it out, right? But for the second half of the year... things that we can think about that are positive drivers. As we pointed out, customer swap fee income growth has been a real highlight vis-a-vis year-ago levels. As a company, we've made a concentrated effort towards promoting that product and underwriting CRE loans with a customer swap in place as opposed to the traditional fixed rate loans. So that is continuing to drive fee income growth. And also, as our loan growth momentum continues and production momentum continues to improve, we are looking at positive trends in other loan-related fee income, you know, origination fees, unused commitment fees, arrangement fees, that general bucket.

Okay, okay. And then shifting to the margin, I didn't see a spot rate in your deck or in the release, but if you had the spot rate on deposits at the end of June and what you're assuming within your outlook in terms of a cumulative data on deposits through the cycle.

The spot rate at the end of June was 2.93%. And that's down, by the way, quarter to date by midpoint in July as well. So it's continuing to improve. In terms of the full beta that we're assuming for the cycle, given the fact that rate cuts have delayed themselves towards October and December, there's not much more beta to be had this year. So there isn't any change to beta expectations vis-a-vis last quarter, but I will share that for the coming cut when that happens, we're planning on executing, you know, betas at a higher pace than we have initial cuts, so 100% or better. Okay. Deposit product, obviously, and then the impact of CDs changes the total deposit beta calculation, as you know, since that's timing-based.

Yep, yep, okay. And then can you just remind us what percent of your loans are truly floating that, you know, reset with each Fed cut, you know, with, you know, territorial now on board? About 42% of our loans is truly floating. Okay. Got it. And then do you have, how much in the way of cost saves do you have left for territorial so we can consider that going forward?

In the territorial franchise, we are very delighted to welcome the territorial team members into the Bank of Hope family, and we have been focusing on strengthening those operations. As you well know, through other M&A, or generally in M&A, the upfront cost saves are executed in the beginning, which generally relate to corporate administrative cost cuts. And as we have said in the past, We plan to focus on maintaining the continuity of the customer experience. So right now, I will say that there is still more integration and companies coming in the second half of the year, but as far as the magnitude, we will share that later in the year.

Okay. I'll step back. Thank you.

Thank you. Once again, if you have a question, please limit them to two, and then you can rejoin the queue. The next question comes from Gary Tenner with DA Davidson. Please go ahead.

Thanks. Good morning. A couple of my questions were already asked, but with the deal closed, CET1 ratio over 12% and the stock below tangible book, any thoughts here on a buyback as the dust settles on the transaction?

Well, Gary, we have been carefully evaluating our capital efficiencies, and the securities repositioning in June was part of our capital deployment strategies, and we are continuing to assess additional opportunities. I think I can't say that much.

Okay, thanks. And then just in terms of the conversion, timing for territorial? When is that going to occur?

Conversion meaning the system conversion?

Yes, system conversion.

Yeah, that is expected to be completed by the end of next year. We have tentatively decided to run a territorial system for the time being because they're system is very close to the expiration of their contract, and we are very close to that.

Okay, so does that just push out the cost savings that you had talked about when the deal was announced? I think it was like 27% or so of territorial expenses. Does that just push that out deeper into next year?

Not necessarily. The core cost and the IT costs were not the biggest component of Territorial's cost base. You look at Territorial's disclosures and their proxy statements, you will see that the largest component of cost savings from that franchise would come from the form of executive compensation.

Right. Okay. All right.

Thank you. The next question comes from Kelly Mata with KBW. Please go ahead.

Hey, good morning. Thanks for the question. I was hoping to circle back to your expectations for loan growth. On an organic basis, it was relatively modest this quarter, but you mentioned you're making some frontline hires to help drive the outlook ahead. I'm wondering if you could share a bit more as to what you're doing on that front and kind of the cadence of their contributions, as I know it can take a bit of time in order for new hires to add to net growth. Thanks.

Yeah, we have been hiring very experienced, talented commercial and corporate bankers over the past several months, and we are continuing to do that. and if you look at our loan production in the second quarter, we have a very meaningful increase from the first quarter, and I think based upon the pipeline that we have at the beginning of the third quarter, our loan production will continue to increase over the rest of the year. In our payoffs, Our payoff in the second quarter was not as high as it was in the first quarter, but still the payoffs and paydown trends remain at elevated levels. And I think once the payoffs and paydowns have been stabilized and normalized with the added origination volumes that we can expect from these new bankers, I think, the loan growth expectation in the third and fourth quarter is pretty doable for us.

Got it. That's helpful. And then a second one from me on asset quality. You guys called out and released the migration of a CRE credit. So, per disclosures, it's well secured and in a prime location. Just as you think about the overall credit picture and what you're seeing, I'm wondering if there's been any shift in how you're viewing asset quality of the portfolio relative to maybe a quarter ago when things were more uncertain with tariffs and just could just provide us with a bit more color as to how you're feeling about credit and what you're watching more carefully. Thanks.

Sure. This is Peter. Yeah, we're actively monitoring our portfolio. I think we're feeling cautiously optimistic. I think a lot of the high levels of uncertainty, although they're still around and we're definitely monitoring the situation, but we do remain cautiously optimistic. I think if you look at our just overall level of potential problem loans, which is really represented by our level of criticized assets, you saw some meaningful decline this quarter. So Really, I think barring any unexpected volatilities in the macroeconomic environment, we do think that asset quality remains manageable and stable.

Got it. I'll step back. Thanks a lot.

Thank you.

Again, if you have a question, please press star then 1. The next question comes from Tim Coffey with Jannie. Please go ahead.

Great morning, everybody. Yeah, Kevin, I'm sorry. Could you provide some commentary on the legacy borrowers in Hope Bancorp, the ones that are on the commercial side, more towards the retail aspect of those businesses, how they did in the second quarter? Because I think at the beginning of the quarter, there might have been a lot of uncertainty around it, but it seems like that uncertainty started to evaporate by the end of the quarter.

Actually, this is Peter. I can probably answer that. You know, I think just a level of uncertainty was much higher, I think, when we first started the quarter in Q2. I think a little bit of that dust is a little bit settling down. There's obviously still a lot of uncertainty. But, you know, actually, I think as we've been monitoring the situation, I think the economy and particularly the consumer base has remained fairly resilient. And although there's still some risks there, and we're definitely being proactive around that, we really haven't seen much impact to our customer base as of yet.

All right, great. Thanks a lot for that, Peter. That's great. And then, Juliana, looking at the deposit portfolio, right? I mean, there seems to be a pretty good balance now between commercial and consumer balances. Is that something, one, you'd like to, you know, continue, maintain that kind of balance? And also, do you have a target for how much broker deposits you'll need going forward?

Well, we have stated in the past our target loan-deposit ratio is to be up to 95%. We're obviously at below 91% there, so we do have some growth and excess liquidity at the moment. However, but that should give you an idea for how much deposit growth we believe we need on an ongoing basis, because we've also said in the past that on a medium-term basis, we would like to target loan growth in the high single digits, right? Now, in terms of the customer-based balance, I think we have a pretty great balance right now between consumer and commercial loans. Our broker deposits are down to 5% of total deposits. So this is a pretty good place from which to focus on generating growth and expanding the customer wallet share and adding new relationships.

Great. Those are my questions. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Tim. And we have a follow-up from Kelly Mata with KBW. Please go ahead.

Hey, thanks for letting me jump back in. Just a quick modeling question for Juliana. Can you remind us how much more one-time costs are yet to be realized? And now with the conversion kicked out a bit, would those occur closer to conversion or is there a cadence to expect for the back half of the year? Thanks.

One second. In the back half of the year, There'll be probably a couple million more of one-time costs in the third quarter and then probably a couple million more in the fourth quarter just from various odds and ends, if you will. So that's what I can share with you right now.

Got it. That's helpful. Thank you.

And we have a follow-up from Gary Tenner from DA Davidson. Please go ahead.

Thanks. I just wanted to ask, I apologize if I missed this, but in terms of the new production in the quarter, what was the average yield on new production?

The average yield on the new production was approximately 676%. Great.

Thank you.

And we have a follow-up from Matthew Clark from Piper Sandler. Please go ahead.

Just another housekeeping item. For next year, the tax rate, I know it's going to come down by 100 basis points, but does that imply 24% for next year?

No, I think that the tax rate for this year on the full year basis at the 21%, when you look at 2026, I think our kind of tax year kind of going forward beyond this year will be, you know, in that 20 percentage. Again, not taking into account any tax law changes that may impact 2026 from the passage of recent federal legislation, okay? So just based on what is in place today, I would say that our tax year kind of going, tax rate going forward will be kind of in that 20, 21% range. And it's down from the prior year, because of the state apportionment tax law change, but also because we are continuing to invest in low-income housing and other tax credit investments to help lower our tax burden.

Okay. Great. And then just net charge-offs this quarter up a little bit. Anything chunky in there? Anything maybe unusual to call out? Just trying to get a sense for where that might go going forward? I know it's tough to say, but.

Yeah, and the charges were up slightly this quarter. I do think that we remain at manageable levels. I mean, we still have some cleanup that we're undergoing right now. So I would just look at sort of just portfolio management as the reason there. But going forward, as you have heard, I think our level of overall problem credits criticize assets going down. NPL did have a little uptick, but it's a real estate property that's well secured. So on the asset quality front, we are, again, cautiously optimistic. I do think there is a roadmap here. The macroeconomic environment continues to support that. We will remain at stable, manageable levels going forward.

Great. Thanks again.

Again, if you have a question, please press star then 1. And we have a follow-up from Kelly Motta from KBW. Please go ahead.

Thanks. Thanks for letting me hop in a third time now. Last question for me on the NII guidance. You maintained it, but you also have the benefit of the securities restructuring in the back half of the year. It seems like some of the guide change is related to taking out a rate cut, the accretion from territorial, but on a core-core basis, it still seems down. Wondering if you could share if that's really just the function of rates or if there's something else that is creating that variance, whether it's maybe some additional pressure on the deposit side or slower loan growth, just Wondering if you could provide some color as to what drove that.

Yeah, I can add a couple comments to that. I mean, if you think about it, when we provided the guidance in April, right, we were looking at a rate curve with a first cut starting in June, so that would have given us two full quarters of a rate cut, and then a cut in September, which would have given us like a full quarter of another cut, right? And all else equal, as you can see in our, you know, thank you disclosures, 100 basis points impacts our NII by 20 million. So, you know, taking out, so, you know, model to model, if we took out the impact of the curve change from our kind of first quarter forecast, that would have taken out about a net $4 million of income. So we were able to make that up and offset that with the securities portfolio repositioning, right? And then the change in the forward curve also impacted the Pace of recognition of accretion higher for longer all else equal does slow down the prepayment speed so The upfront accretion in year one for us. We're now looking at 12 million versus 14 so that kind of gets you to the math of maintaining the NII unchanged and also, you know, we're continuing to improve the pace of originations, but I Quarter to quarter, the blended loan yield on originations did decrease a little bit. So continued kind of competitive pricing in the market for loan growth is also, you know, coming through. But basically, the maps on it are really, really curve-driven and accretion-driven. And then you can ask yourself... we do to, you know, kind of change that conversation without just waiting for another rate cut. We've been very proactive in working on our deposit mix and reducing our higher cost deposits as you saw the continued improvement from broker deposit exposure, et cetera.

That's really, really helpful. Thanks again. I'll step back for good now.

This concludes our question and answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to management for any closing remarks.

Thank you. Thank you, Drew. Once again, thank you all for joining us today and we look forward to speaking with you in three months. So long, everyone.

The conference has now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect.