Independent Bank Group, Inc

Good morning and welcome to the Independent Bank Group first quarter 2023 earnings call. We appreciate you joining us. The related earnings press release and investor presentation can be accessed on our website at ir.ifinancials.com. I would like to remind you that remarks made today may include forward-looking statements. Those statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual and expected results to differ. We intend such statements to be covered by Safe Harbor provisions for forward-looking statements. Please see page 5 of the text in the release or page 2 of the slide presentation for our Safe Harbor statement. All comments made during today's call are subject to that statement. Please note that if we give guidance about future results, that guidance is a statement of management's belief at the time the statement is made and we assume no obligation to publicly update guidance. In this call, we will discuss several financial measures considered to be non-GAAP under the SEC's rules. Reconciliations of these financial measures to the most directly comparable GAAP financial measures are included in our release. I'm joined this morning by our Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, David Brooks, our Vice Chairman, Dan Brooks, and our Chief Financial Officer, Paul Langdale. At the end of their remarks, David will open the call to questions. With that, I will turn it over to David.

Thank you, Ankita. Good morning, everyone, and thanks for joining the call today. For the first quarter, we reported a gap net loss of $37.5 million, or $0.91 per diluted share, which includes the impact of the $100 million legal settlement expense that was previously disclosed on February 27th. This one-time payment settles litigation ongoing since 2009 involving Stanford International Bank and related entities that was inherited in connection with our 2014 acquisition of Bank of Houston. This settlement will resolve all current and potential future claims related to the Stanford entities, and we believe this settlement to be in our shareholders' best interest as it enables us to avoid the cost, risk, and distraction of protracted litigation. Excluding this one-time legal expense, adjusted net income for the quarter was $44.1 million, or $1.07 per diluted share. Our core operating business continues to maintain a healthy level of profitability despite the challenges presented by the volatile macroeconomic and interest rate environment. Our underlying business is buoyed by a strong balance sheet and a resilient asset quality with non-performing assets of just 32 basis points of total assets and net charge also just four basis points annualized. In addition, We continue to maintain robust capital levels with an estimated total capital ratio of 11.85% and a TCE ratio of 7.31%. Those sharper than anticipated funding cost pressures for the first quarter compressed our net interest margin by 32 basis points to 317. We remain encouraged by the continued repricing of our maturing loans in the mid sevens. This repricing should be a consistent tailwind to our adjusted loan yields, which expanded by 32 basis points in the first quarter to 533. While accumulating the benefit of higher loan yields will be more gradual, our pursuit of incremental expense discipline is far more immediate. Adjusted non-interest expense for the quarter was $84.9 million, down $3.5 million from a linked quarter due to the continued realization of benefits from our expense management initiatives. And with that overview, I'll turn the call over to Paul to give more details on the financials.

Thank you, David. And good morning, everyone. Starting with the balance sheet this morning, total assets increased by $540 million from the length quarter to $18.8 billion, which was primarily driven by excess liquidity held on balance sheet funded by short-term FHLB advances. On balance sheet cash increased to $1.05 billion at quarter end. The company decided to strategically increase our liquidity position out of an abundance of caution and in response to the macroeconomic environment, which is consistent with our philosophy of conservatism in gearing the balance sheet. On the liability side, non-interest bearing deposit balances decreased steadily throughout the quarter as depositors sought higher yielding alternatives for their cash balances. Quarter-end non-interest-bearing balances were $4.15 billion, down from $4.74 billion at year-end 2022. Average non-interest-bearing balances during the first quarter were $4.40 billion, and most of the non-interest-bearing deposit attrition occurred prior to the end of February as depositors sought higher rates. A portion of these deposits were moved off balance sheet to our wholly-owned subsidiary, Private Capital Management. During the quarter, approximately 184 million of deposits flowed to private capital management to be deployed in market-based liquidity management strategies. And overall AUM at private capital management increased by 235 million, their largest quarter on record. Since these deposits remain in our ecosystem, we expect to have the opportunity to recapture some of these funds on balance sheet in the future. Slide 20 shows the deposit funding vertical trends. Interest-bearing branch deposits were down 3% or $217 million for the quarter, which was mostly a result of seasonality and yield-seeking behavior early in the year. From February 28 through quarter end, interest-bearing branch deposits reversed this trend and increased. The increase of $197 million in brokered CDs was opportunistically executed in February when market rates fell below 5%. The weighted average rate for brokered CDs added in the first quarter was 4.73%. The onset of broader industry events in mid-March meaningfully impacted the pricing and availability of both brokered and non-brokered specialty liquidity. During this time, we opted to instead utilize less expensive short-term FHLB advances to supplement funding. This included the replacement of $556 million of non-brokered specialty treasury deposits. public funds balance has increased by $101 million from year end. As anticipated, the cost of brokered funds has dropped meaningfully following quarter end, and we have begun to strategically replace maturing FHLB advances with brokered funds as appropriate. So far in the second quarter, we have added $162 million in brokered funds at an average rate of 4.9% and three six- and nine-month tenors. Due to this, FHLB utilization has begun to decline during the second quarter. As noted on slide 19, adjusted uninsured deposits, which excludes fully collateralized public funds deposits, totaled $5.26 billion, or 37.4% of deposits, at March 31, 2023. As of quarter end, we have $5.5 billion of immediate borrowing capacity between the FHLB, the Fed, and Fed Funds line. enough to cover all uninsured deposits. We also maintain access to multiple contingent sources of deposit funding with more than $7 billion of additional capacity, which brings total contingent funding capacity to over $12 billion. Other borrowings increased by $70.5 million during the quarter as a result of the company drawing $100 million on our holding company line of credit to facilitate the repayment of the $30 million tranche of subordinated debt redeemed at quarter end that had moved to floating. as well as to facilitate the repayment of the legal settlement expense discussed in David's remarks. Since quarter end, we have repaid $32.5 million on the holding company line of credit, and we expect to retire the remainder of this balance by the end of the third quarter. Regulatory capital levels remain healthy and well in excess of well-capitalized minimums, with a common equity Tier 1 ratio of 9.67%, a Tier 1 ratio of 10.03%, and a total capital ratio of 11.85% at quarter end. Additionally, the TCE ratio remains strong at 7.31%. Moving on to the income statement, net interest income decreased by $13.9 million from the linked quarter and $3.2 million from the first quarter of 2022. NII was impacted by slower loan growth and increased funding costs during the quarter. While net growth was impacted by first quarter seasonality, Yields continue to benefit from gross production and adjustments in pricing. The average loan yield net of acquired loan accretion and PPP income was 5.33% for the quarter, up 32 basis points from the linked quarter. Funding costs, as discussed, were impacted by the remixing of non-interest bearing to interest bearing balances during the quarter, as well as higher liquidity levels held on balance sheet. Non-interest income increased by 1.5 million compared to the linked quarter, which included the recognition of a $318,000 benefit claim related to the BOLI portfolio. Adjusted noninterest expense was $84.9 million, a decrease of $3.5 million versus the linked quarter. The primary drivers of the reduction in noninterest expense were lower salaries and benefits expense as well as lower professional fees. Looking ahead, we will continue to maintain expense discipline and explore additional targeted opportunities to strategically reduce noninterest expense through initiatives. These are all the comments I have today. So with that, I'll turn the call over to Dan.

Thanks, Paul. Loans held for investment were $13.6 billion in the first quarter. Loan growth excluding mortgage warehouse and PPP loans totaled $8.5 million or 0.2% annualized for the quarter. New production during the quarter was subdued due to seasonal slowness in the first quarter as well as lower demand across our markets. Despite the lower growth, during the quarter we originated $599 million of new commitments and $315 million of which funded during the quarter. We continue to see opportunities in the pipeline and we continue to underwrite with the same discipline that has guided us through past economic cycles. Average mortgage warehouse purchase loans remain stable at $298 million versus the linked quarter. Our expectation is for this business to continue to remain flat at the current levels. Credit quality metrics continue to strengthen during the quarter. Total non-performing assets decreased to $60.1 million or 0.32% of total assets at quarter ends. Other real estate owned decreased to $22.7 due to an impairment of the $1.2 million recognized during the quarter. Net charge-offs totaled just four basis points annualized for the first quarter. We continue to see the loan portfolio exhibit resilience in the face of volatile macroeconomic conditions, and we remain confident in the strength of our credit quality as we enter the second quarter. These are all the comments I have related to the loan portfolio this morning. So with that, I'll turn it back over to David. Thanks, Dan. Looking ahead, we remain focused on optimizing our franchise to navigate a complex macroeconomic and banking landscape. We remain encouraged by the continued gross loan production and the repricing of our fixed rate loans, and we will continue to focus on opportunities to strategically play both defense and offense on the deposit base. While loan production was seasonally lower in Q1, we are seeing solid opportunities in the pipeline and still expect to grow loans at 45% annualized rate for the remainder of the year. In the second quarter, we will continue to optimize our expense base for the current environment. We expect to achieve targeted expense reduction opportunities that will allow us to incrementally manage the run rate down over the course of 23. Thank you for taking the time to join us today. We'll now open the line to questions. Operator?

Thank you. At this time, we'll be conducting a question and answer session. If you'd like to ask a question, please press star 1 on your telephone keypad. A confirmation tone will indicate your line is in the question queue. You may press star 2 if you would like to remove your question from the queue. For participants using speaker equipment, it may be necessary to pick up your handset before pressing the star keys. Our first question comes from the line of Brad Millsaps with Piper Sandler. Please proceed with your question.

Hey, good morning.

Hey, good morning, Brad.

Thanks for taking my questions. I'm just curious, Paul, a lot of movement, you know, with the balance sheet at the end of the quarter, I'd be curious if you'd be able to provide us sort of, you know, spot deposit rates and maybe even spot loan rates and maybe how that, you know, might inform, you know, your margin outlook as you think about sort of all the moving parts, you know, as we kind of move through the next couple of quarters.

Sure, Brad. Happy to provide some color on that. On the earning asset side, our loan yields are coming on in the mid sevens. We've reliably seen that for the last couple of months, and we expect that pace to continue based on what we see in the pipeline. On the deposit side, the marginal funding that we're adding to our balance sheet is just under 5%. We've tried to manage that rate relative to the liquidity available in the market and relative to our strategy, and so that's our expectation to hold funding at that level, depending on the trajectory, of course, of monetary policy.

Okay, maybe just drilling down a little bit further, I mean, you had total deposit cost of, I think, around 170 basis points. Inter-sparing costs were a little over 2.4%. If you thought about where those numbers kind of moved to, you know, at the end of the quarter, given all the moving parts, you know, are you seeing the pace of the beta slow down, or would you expect, you know, something, you know, similar to what you saw in the first quarter?

The betas in the first quarter, Brad, were driven significantly by the non-interest-bearing remixing trends that we saw into interest-bearing, so adding those interest-bearing funds. We didn't expect the magnitude of non-interest-bearing mix shift in the first quarter. It was really driven by accelerated yield-seeking behavior that coming out of the fourth quarter really accelerated into January and February. But most of the NIM pressure, I think, has happened in the first quarter And following quarter end, we've seen a stabilization in funding costs, which leads us to anticipate that NIM will bottom out in Q2 and start expanding in Q3 and beyond as earning asset yields begin to climb. So, it's hard to give an exact range given the dynamism and the environment, but we certainly don't anticipate the kind of betas and NIM compression in Q2 that we saw in Q1.

And, Paul, just the kind of final follow-up, would you expect to get a loan beta around 38% in the quarter. Obviously, you've been talking about the repricing characteristics of your loan book for a while. Do you expect that to continue to step up? And is it more heavily weighted in one quarter versus another? Or is it just going to kind of be this sort of gradual climb as we move through the year?

It's weighted heavier in the back half of the year in 23 than in the front half of the year. We have seasonal slowness usually, especially in the first quarter. So the amount of bulk repricing that we get in the first quarter is reliably less than in the back half of the year when we see the most growth. I will say that we certainly do expect, given our loan growth guide, to see those earning assets, especially loan yields, pick up. And the more production we have and the more net growth we have, the more that will impact the yield.

Okay, great. Thank you, guys. I'll hop back in too. Okay, thanks, Brett.

Thank you. Our next question comes in line of Brandon King with Truist Security. Please proceed with your question.

Hey, good morning. Good morning, Brandon. See, I had another question on deposits. I know before it was the goal to match deposits with loan growth, but I wanted to get updated thoughts on your outlook for where you see deposits trending for the remainder of the year.

Our focus, Brandon, really remains on growing the core deposit base. We believe that we've equipped our teams with the tools necessary to successfully compete both offensively and defensively against what we're seeing in the market. It's important to note also that relationship deposits do factor into our lending decisions, and we believe that our ability to produce loans also translates to an ability to produce deposits. We're going to be very focused on making sure that we can grow deposits and can fund loans with deposit growth. Obviously, the accelerated attrition that we saw in Q1, we don't expect a repeat in Q2 because we've seen some stabilization since quarter end. So given what we've passed our teams with and given what we're seeing in the market, we think we're in a good position to grow deposits in Q2.

Okay. And I know you mentioned in the commentary as far as the deposits moving kind of off balance sheet, but still within the bank. What do you think it would take for those deposits to come back and kind of when do you anticipate that happening?

I think it depends entirely on the trajectory of monetary policy and specifically the yield in the treasury market. Most of the liquidity management products out there are based on treasury yields and a laddered treasury strategy. So as we see the Fed hit the terminal rate, especially if we have some economic storm clouds on the horizon, I think there'll be an opportunity for banks to be very competitive on rate versus the treasury market. but it'll just depend again on the trajectory of inflation and monetary policy.

Okay, and there's nothing, I guess, internally that you plan on doing to kind of encourage those deposits coming back sooner rather than later?

I think it depends on the idiosyncratic beliefs and behavior of the customers and what they're specifically looking for. Obviously, we have opportunities to incentivize customers to return that cash on the balance sheet, But as of right now, it's a relationship-driven strategy that we really focus on understanding the individual customer, their needs, and we really want to provide them with a total suite of solutions that fits what they're looking for.

Okay.

I will hop back in the queue. Thanks for taking my questions.

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Brett Robinson with HubJ Group. Please proceed with your question.

Hey, good morning, gentlemen. Good morning, Brett. Good morning, Brett. Wanted to, I guess, first start on expenses. And, you know, the expense levels are obviously something that you're focused on this year. And the numbers in 1Q on a core basis were a little better than I expected. Can you talk maybe, Paul or David, about what you think you'll achieve from here on the expense side and just a good way to think about maybe the efficiency ratio relative to what we're trying to get done on the revenue side. Thanks.

Sure, Brett. I'm happy to talk to expenses. Obviously, we remain focused on notching incremental expense discipline. That is something that we have expressed a clear intent to continue to focus on over the last several calls. So if you look at our expenses in Q1, they are seasonally a little bit lower than they typically are. I would expect the expense run rate to be around $88 million for the remainder of the year. Midway through the first quarter, we did have our merit increases, so that does impact the run rate on a go-forward basis. The trajectory of expenses and the magnitude of savings that we can realize is going to be dependent upon the opportunities that that we see across our expense base. Obviously, we're looking under every rock and making sure that we're being mindful of gearing the organization for the current economic environment.

Okay. That's helpful. And then on capital, I want to make sure I understood that correctly. You repaid the $30 million of sub-debt post-quarter? Was that correct?

No, we repaid that at quarter end.

At quarter end, okay.

And that was... three month LIBOR plus 283. So that was a little over 8% paper for modeling purposes.

And so would the plan be to replace that in the near term?

We continue to accrete enough capital to be able to not replace that little $30 million challenge.

Okay. And then any, any thoughts on, on capital generally, just, you know, that I think some, some banks were thinking about running with excess capital. Just due to some uncertainty, is there a specific capital ratio that you're focused on and maybe what capital level would you be trying to target maybe later this year or in the environment?

Yeah, Brett. Let me address it from a high level just where I believe the board is and what our strategy is, how we're thinking about it. We have continued to approve our dividend at its current level that we came into the year with. We finished fourth quarter of 22 and into 23 with our dividend level. We expect to keep that constant for the foreseeable future, the next few quarters, as we observe what's going on macroeconomically, as Paul has said. We have a buyback in place or approved, but we're not expecting to be active with it for the foreseeable future. And part of that is what you alluded to, Brett, that is we're watching closely what's going on with the economy. The markets seem to be pricing in now at least a moderate recession and some rate declines in the back half of the year where we're not making any assumptions around that, but we're watching and preparing. And so we're going to allow capital to accrete, as Paul just said, here in the next few quarters and continue to strengthen that ratio. We're not expecting, as Paul said, to add any additional sub-debt or capital at this time. And we feel really good about where we are. As far as specific capital ratios, Paul, you may have a thought on that, but I think broadly we feel good where we are, Brett, and we expect those to accrete up over the next few quarters.

The only thing I would add, Brett, is that we continue to target the TPE ratio north of 7%. That's something I think you'll see continue to increase as we accrete capital over the remainder of the year.

Yeah, we like that from that standpoint, Brett, you know, particularly the fact that we have a small bond portfolio and a relatively insignificant AOCI charge at this time. So, you know, we think that puts us in a good spot from an overall capital standpoint.

Okay. That's helpful. Thanks so much for the call. Okay. Thanks, Brett.

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Michael Rose with Raymond James. Please proceed with your question.

Hey, good morning, everyone. Thanks for taking my question. To go back to deposits, I think like every bank, you're seeing a mix shift into obviously higher cost deposits. Any sense from a modeling perspective where you think that mix shift kind of troughs? Like where does DDA trough, and then if you can just kind of update us on beta expectations, you know, cumulative through the cycle. Thanks. Thanks, Michael.

Good morning.

Sure, Michael. Thanks for the question. As I mentioned earlier, the pace of noninterest-bearing attrition was really accelerated through the first part of the first quarter due to yield-seeking behavior. Since quarter end, we've seen that pace slow down meaningfully and begin to stabilize. So, based on what we know today, There could be some incremental pressures. The Fed has the terminal rate, but all in, we don't expect to see the big move down in non-interest-bearing balances that we saw in Q1 repeat itself. So if non-interest-bearing being a percentage of the deposit book it is today, I'd expect that ratio to gradually come down maybe another 1% to 2% over the coming 12 months, although I wouldn't expect any significant non-interest-bearing runoff relative to what we've seen in Q1. From a beta standpoint, as I mentioned earlier, betas will slow down given that we've already passed on a meaningful amount of deposit costs increases to our customers. It has been our stated strategy since the beginning of this rate hike cycle to play defense with our interest bearing balances and make sure that we're taking care of our customers. If we pay rate to anyone, we would like it to be to our core customers. And so that's why you've seen us, you know, have a little bit sharper betas over the last couple of quarters relative to the interest bearing branch book. And I think given where we are in the cycle right now, you'll see those betas meaningfully slow.

Very helpful. And Paul, I think you mentioned that you expected deposit balance growth in the second quarter. Appreciate that. I would expect that, you know, giving commentary around maybe some of those deposits that kind of moved off balance sheet, potentially coming back on, that we should expect, you know, continued growth through the year. And you guys, I assume the expectation would be to keep that loan to deposit ratio sub 100%.

Yes, absolutely. We do expect to keep the loan to deposit ratio under 100%. And we are employing an all of the above strategy in the deposit book. We like to maintain A reasonable mix shift, especially among the broker deposits, keep it relatively short duration, use a laddered strategy, use a number of different products. We really do believe that strategically achieving granularity across the deposit book, both in our core deposits and our wholesale flavored deposits, is something that will benefit us long term and really dovetails well with our conservatism and gearing the balance sheet. So that's something I think you should expect us to continue to do over the coming quarters.

OK, great. And then maybe just finally for me, back to expenses, appreciate the color on the expense run rate. Maybe just holistically, if you can balance for us cost saving efforts with investments as you continue to grow the franchise and just how you balance that maybe in the context of How do you think about the efficiency ratio kind of when we get into the intermediate term now that funding cost profiles have definitely changed? Just trying to get some holistic color on how you balance investments versus savings. Thanks.

Sure, Michael. It's obviously the same conundrum that every management team has across the country right now, given the economic environment. But we've made significant progress. investments in our infrastructure over the last couple of years. As you know, we've spoken about it clearly in technology and process improvement, risk, enterprise risk management, build out, things like that, that we continue to do and continue to invest in. And we're not going to back away from our commitments there and our strategy there. We're clearly, as we think about the next few years, you know, assessing what the highest priorities are and moving ahead on those projects. But then at the same time, you know, looking at our organization in our org chart, you know, division by division and just understanding, you know, where we've invested and what that investment is going toward in terms of the high-level objectives of our company. So I just think it's a healthy process that we go through on a regular basis anyway of you know, investing and then assessing, investing and then assessing, you know, how we're doing there. So, so we're continuing to go through that process. As you know, we really started it last fall and just, you know, we expected that it was going to be a difficult environment in 23. And so it's playing out how we expect it. And we will continue to be diligent around that. We're not going to, you know, do anything from a cost cutting standpoint that, that harms our franchise or our long term value. We believe deeply in the markets we're in. We believe deeply in our team on the field who are day to day interacting with our customers. We've got terrific customer base in our markets. As you know, we don't have national business lines and things like that. Our strategy is really focused on the four great markets we're in, dealing with our customers, in those markets. And so whatever it, you know, whatever we have to invest in to meet the needs, as Paul said earlier, to make sure we've got the product set and the technology and everything that our customers need. And at the same time, being mindful that, you know, we're running a business here and, you know, we need to run a high performing business and we're committed to doing that.

Appreciate the caller. Thanks everyone. Thanks, Mike.

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Brady Gailey with KBW. Please proceed with your question.

Hey, thanks. Good morning, guys. Good morning. I know we've talked about the components of the net interest margin, but when you look overall at the net interest margin, how do you think that trends from here? I know in the past we've talked about, you know, once the Fed pauses, your CRE loan yield will catch up and you could actually see some NIM expansion. But how do you think about the overall NIM from here?

So Brady, as I discussed a little bit earlier, we saw an accelerated NIM compression in the first quarter due to predominantly the mix shift as well as some funding cost pressures. We don't expect to see that repeat in the second quarter. We do expect to see NIM bottom in the second quarter. And the magnitude of the decline from Q1 to Q2 will be less than it was from Q4 to Q1. But on the whole, it's hard to handicap exactly where the bottom is. From Q3, Q4 onward, we do expect to see NIM expansion because we do believe that we've hit close to the peak in terms of our funding costs with the Fed, assuming a Fed terminal rate of just above 5%. ultimately the fixed rate loan repricing, those yields will continue to expand on loans and that'll continue to drive our NIM upward through cycle. So it's a little bit different due to the short duration nature of our CRE book. We'll have that continued loan yield expansion over the next three to four years.

All right. That's helpful. And then Paul, on your expense guidance of $88 million per quarter for the rest of the year, Does that incorporate any further cost cutting or is that just where you see it as of now? And if you did decide to do further cost cuts, that would be a benefit to that number.

There could be upside to that number, Brady, but it's going to be dependent on the opportunities we identify and our ability to really execute on them. Okay.

And then lastly, for me, you know, I know independent is a pretty big commercial real estate lender. And the market seems to be concerned about CRE over the next couple of years. But I mean, you guys have a great track record over a lot of cycles in commercial real estate. Maybe just your updated thought on CRE over the next couple of years.

Yeah, good morning, Brady. This is Dan. I'll take that one. As you can imagine, we continue to scrub that portfolio and stress it. In particular, the ones that are maturing in the next couple of years. for higher rates in an effort to identify any potential risks there. And in short, we're confident, based on that, that we will continue to see it perform well in any slowdown. As you know, we've always employed a disciplined approach to growing our book. We've avoided holding outsized pieces of credits, which limits the impact to any individual credit that we have. We relied on cash equity, which stays in the deal, versus appraised equity, which we have seen time and again through downturns that that makes a difference. We've not used trended rents and underwriting, which I know some banks have been prone to do. We think that sets you up for some issues when you have contraction in that. For the most part, we have secondary sources of repayment that are vetted, and as you know, we stay in the markets that we're in with our known borrowers, which those strongest markets in the country, as David mentioned, have seen strong NOI growth with material increase in rents and occupancy over the last five years. So the coverages provide significant cushion in NOI and a strong debt service coverage. We have been stressing the book, as most banks have been, in particular for those that are maturing here in the next couple years. And I would tell you those have average rates currently in the high fours, where they have fixed rates. And our stressing of that all the way up to the high sevens indicates that that book is going to perform really well. in there and the few that will have some work with the customers have strong guarantor support with the verified liquidity. So again, we feel very confident in that at this point. A couple of add-ons I would have there, Brady. One is I think what Dan is saying at a granular level is playing out a little bit at the higher, more strategic level. We saw, for instance, in our loan growth, we generated right out about the amount of loans in the first quarter that we expected, but we had an unusual number of pay downs in the first quarter. And that was driven by mostly asset sales that were driven by the cap rates continuing to be lower in our markets than what I think sellers may be expected. So, for instance, there are investment groups and wealthy families that are getting offers on properties that are at lower cap rates than what you would expect given our interest rate environment so it speaks to the strength of the underlying markets and that's the point i'm making with that uh is we've seen these pay downs are coming from asset sales at really strong prices uh and and as dan said as we've seen these loans reset pricing and things the nois have been very robust the growth in the last three or five years since we made the loan or since that last price reset to where it is today. So we're not seeing pressure there. And the final comment I'll make about the CRE portfolio, just to emphasize again what Dan said, is that our loan sizes, our loan holds are just different than what a lot of banks that have a big CRE concentration or a large CRE concentration have. Our average hold sizes are much smaller. We have many more loans against many different properties. So, you know, diversification of risk by not only asset class but within the asset classes. So, again, and I understand right now we're facing a potential, you know, as Paul said earlier, storm clouds on the horizon. that people are concerned about it, and we get it. And to some extent, you know, it's going to have to play out, right, and so that investors and folks can see exactly how different banks' asset quality holds up. We continue to be very confident in how ours will hold up, and, you know, but we'll just have to, you know, play it out the next few quarters and see how the economy does. But we remain confident in not seeing any difficulties on the horizon at this point.

That's good, Keller. Thanks, guys. Thanks. Great.

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, as a reminder, if you'd like to join the question queue, please press star 1 on your telephone keypad. Our next question comes from the line of Matt Olney with Stevens Inc. Please proceed with your question.

Hey, thanks. Good morning, everybody. Good morning, Matt. Paul, thanks for all the commentary on the deposit cost and the margin. I'll take a swing at the topic, too. If I assume a deposit beta that moderates in 2Q from what we saw in 1Q, and if I assume that the NIB outflow, the pressure there kind of eases up quite a bit in the second quarter as well, I'm still getting a margin that drops below 3% in the third quarter, and that would still be kind of less than that margin pressure that you talked about in the first quarter. I just want to make sure I'm thinking about this right as far as kind of where that margin could ultimately drop. Thanks.

The core NIM execretion is going to depend upon a variety of factors, Matt. Obviously, we have a few offsets relative to our costs redeeming that tranche of sub-debt. As I noted, we did repay part of the borrowings that we had at the end of last quarter as well. So while we do still expect some incremental NIM compression, we do believe it should hold in a reasonable area around three. so that's our expectation going into q2 okay thanks for that paul and you mentioned you paid down a part of that fhlb um more recently any color on kind of what that balance is um currently i don't have the updated balance right in front of me but we continue to use short-term advances on the fhlb front what we did matt in the back half of March as we really focused on using short duration FHLB advances so that we could replace those funds selectively with brokered and core deposits as we pursued our growth initiatives in that category. The funding markets were very dislocated in the last two weeks of March and the cost for both broker deposits and specialty deposits were significantly higher than where they are today. So we waited for those rates to come down at quarter end and started adding those funds back after quarter end.

And, Paul, on that note, how favorable is that trade as you move back into some of the specialty products over the last few weeks relative to FHLB? Any context for how much more favorable that is versus the FHLB?

So it's not meaningfully favorable over FHLB. It's probably a spread of about 15 basis points today. But it was very favorable related to versus the brokered market in mid-March.

Got it. Okay. That's helpful, Paul. Thanks for that. And then other questions have been addressed. I guess just lastly on the mortgage warehouse, I think Dan mentioned expect some stability there. Just any color on stability versus end of period or average, quite the delta we saw in the first quarter. Thanks.

Yeah. Matt, this is Dan. Good morning. I think we indicated in there that we averaged right around almost $300 million for the quarter. We actually saw a significant increase in March and into the quarter above $400 million. We continue to be at that level here in April. As we have indicated in the past, we expect it to be fairly flat for the year. following the rest of the market. But we did see some increase, as you will see there.

Okay. All right. Thank you, guys.

Thanks, Matt. Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, that concludes our question and answer session. I'll turn the floor back to Mr. Brooks for any final comments.

Thank you. I appreciate everyone joining this morning. We remain encouraged about the position of our company relative to being nimble for whatever comes our way for the balance of the year and we expect that we'll continue to see good growth and we're confident in our team and confident in our ability to execute in this environment and looking forward to what the next few quarters brings and appreciate everyone's interest. Always happy to be available if you need us for anything. Feel free to reach out. Hope everyone has a great day. Thanks.