Popular Inc (BPOP) 2016 Q1 法說會逐字稿

Good morning and welcome to the Popular, Inc. first-quarter 2016 earnings conference call. All participants will be in listen-only mode. (Operator Instructions). After today's presentation there will be an opportunity to ask questions. (Operator Instructions). Please note this event is being recorded.

I would now like to turn the conference over to the Investor Relations Officer at Popular, Inc., Brett Scheiner. Please go ahead.

Good morning and thank you for joining us on today's call. Today I am joined by our Chairman and CEO, Richard Carrion; our CFO, Carlos Vazquez; and our CRO, Lidio Soriano, who will review our first-quarter results and then answer your questions. They will be joined in the Q&A session by other members of our management team.

Before we start, I would like to remind you that on today's call we may make forward-looking statements that are based on management's current expectations and are subject to risks and uncertainties. Factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from these forward-looking statements are set forth within today's earnings press release and are detailed in our SEC filings, our financial quarterly release and supplement. You may find today's press release and our SEC filings on our webpage at Popular.com.

I will now turn the call over to Mr. Richard Carrion.

Good morning and thank you for joining the call. I would like to first address the highlights and key events of the first quarter, then I will present an update on our business and our thoughts regarding the fiscal and economic situation in Puerto Rico. Carlos will comment on the quarter's financial results and Lidio will provide an update of credit trends and metrics.

Please turn to slide number two. In the first quarter, Popular earned net income of $85 million, down $13 million from last quarter's adjusted results. We continued to generate strong revenues with capital levels well above peer averages. Tangible book value was $43.55, up from $42.18 last quarter. Our net interest margin of 4.43% increased from last quarter's 4.39%. Our spreads remained strong relative to peers with our Puerto Rico net interest margin of 4.87%. We are also encouraged by the trends in our US business particularly the strong commercial loan production.

Total NPAs this quarter of $848 million including covered loans were up $5 million from last quarter's $843 million, mostly due to an increase in OREO balances. Noncovered NPLs were $600 million or 2.7% of noncovered loans, down $2 million from last quarter. NPL inflows increased $9 million when compared to the previous quarter driven by a single commercial borrower in the US.

Our net charge-offs were $42 million or 76 basis points, down from last quarter's $83 million or 148 basis points.

At quarter end, available holding company liquidity stood at approximately $402 million. This liquidity position provides in excess of two years debt service coverage with no maturities until 2019. In addition, the market value of our stake in EVERTEC is approximately $163 million and significantly exceeds our position's current book value of $35 million.

As investors, we will continue to participate in a proportionate share of the Company's income while our investment also represents an additional source of capital flexibility and potential holding company liquidity.

During last quarter's third quarter, we re-instituted a common stock dividend and intend to return additional capital to our shareholders over time.

Please turn to slide number three. Before I turn it over to Carlos, let me comment on our Puerto Rico government exposures and the Puerto Rico economy. The majority of our direct Puerto Rico government exposure is in loans to municipalities, not publicly traded securities of the central government or its public corporation. Our underwriting process, the structure and the size of our Puerto Rico government exposure relative to our capital base gives us comfort.

Our direct outstanding exposure is $565 million down $13 million from the previous quarter and down $248 million from last year. We will continue to monitor developments in this portfolio closely and make future adjustments as needed while selectively participating in funding the Puerto Rico government's capital needs where we feel the risk reward is appropriate.

Regarding the Puerto Rico government's fiscal challenges, we continue to believe that any successful solution will require three things. One, a legal framework for our debt restructuring; two, an effective Fiscal Control Board; and three, a meaningful economic stimulus plan. This is like a three-legged stool, all legs are necessary and no one or two are sufficient.

Over the last few weeks, the US Congress House committee on natural resources has produced draft legislation that would create a Fiscal Control board on the island and a legal framework and path towards an orderly debt restructuring. This legislation, however, has not yet come out of committee.

Political processes however promising are inherently unpredictable. The proposed US Congressional legislation is being pursued in an election year. There are also two related US Supreme Court cases pending which may have bearing on this issue. While we are encouraged by the possibility of congressional action, we are disappointed at the lack of economic stimulus being discussed within the legislation.

Notwithstanding these legislative efforts, the government of Puerto Rico faces multiple fiscal and liquidity challenges in the coming weeks and months. In particular, a large GDB payment due next week. We are convinced the central government of Puerto Rico will fall short of the liquidity to meet its obligations in the next few months and immediate action is required.

While the Puerto Rican economy has been relatively resilient, unfortunately the longer these issues drag on the more negative an impact it will have. In the interim, the current uncertainty harms both commercial investment and consumer confidence.

We will remain attentive to the current situation and the potential impact on our customers. However, our strong market position, significant liquidity, excess capital levels, internal capital generation and risk management practices remain key to our performance.

We have operated in a weak economy for the past 10 years. Despite that, the strong revenues generated by our Puerto Rico bank have produced positive earnings in each of those years. In the last few years we have shifted the risk profile of our credit portfolio, enhanced our operations in the US, increased profitability and grown our capital.

With that progress in mind, we are prepared to manage through a variety of potential scenarios. The strength of the capital position and the future earnings power of the bank gave us the confidence to resume a common stock dividend which was an important milestone for us.

Please turn to slide number four as our CFO, Carlos Vazquez, discusses our financial results in further detail.

Thank you, Richard, and good morning. Slide four presents our financial summary for the quarter. The prior quarter's results are reconciled to GAAP figures in the appendix to the slide deck. Today's earnings press release details variances from last year's fourth quarter, the largest being lower fee income which was offset in part by a lower loan-loss provision and lower operating expense.

Net interest income for the first quarter was $352 million, up $2 million from the fourth quarter as higher investment and commercial loan income was offset by lower Westernbank income and a slightly higher cost of funds.

We continued to deliver organic commercial loan growth in our US operations with quarterly growth of 5%, down slightly from 6% last quarter. Despite this US-based growth, our outlook for stable overall loan balances for 2016 remains unchanged. We anticipate that US loan growth will compensate for Westernbank runoff in Puerto Rico.

On the island, we have offset limited organic growth with selective loan portfolio purchases over the last few years. We will continue to pursue this acquisition strategy if attractive transactions become available.

The average yield of our $2.1 billion Westernbank loan portfolio decreased to 8.76% from 8.82% last quarter. We expect similar yields on this portion of our loan book for the next few quarters, slowly declining thereafter as a result of ongoing loan resolutions, prepayments and the quarterly recast of the portfolio's expected cash flows.

The total cost of our interest-bearing deposits were up 3 basis points to 57 basis points on higher cost of time deposits and increased money market balances, mostly in our US operations. Noninterest income excluding FDIC loss share activity decreased by $21 million compared to last quarter but increased $5 million from last year's first quarter. The sequential quarter decline was due in part to the contingent insurance premiums that are recorded every year in the fourth quarter.

In addition, a negative impact from our quarterly MSR valuation and lower mortgage securitization activity also impacted results. Popular's Puerto Rico mortgage business originated $228 million in loans in the first quarter, down from $235 million last quarter and from $340 million the first quarter of last year.

Total operating expenses for the quarter were down $3 million to $302 million. This decrease was mostly driven by seasonally lower business promotion expenses and lower professional fees. We continue to expect quarterly operating expenses to average $305 million to $310 million through the end of 2016.

Our effective tax rate for the first quarter was 28%, in line with our guidance. For the rest of 2016, we continue to expect our quarterly tax rate to average between 27% and 29%.

Our reported $219 million receivable from the FDIC includes $70 million related to the single-family mortgage loss share agreement which expires in 4.5 years. The remaining $149 million represents reimbursable losses that remain in dispute.

While we currently expect to collect the disputed balance, any amount remaining in the loss share asset ultimately collected from the FDIC will be charged off.

Please turn to the next slide. We continue to enjoy strong capital levels relative to Mainland and Puerto Rico peers as well as with respect to well capitalized regulatory requirements. Our Tier 1 common equity ratio was 15.8%, down from 16.2% in the prior quarter driven by the phased-in provisions of Basel III which disallows some portions of our capital that previously counted as Tier 1. All of Popular's capital ratios remain robust and well above regulatory requirements.

As Richard mentioned in September of 2015, we resumed payment of a quarterly common stock dividend of $0.15 per share. We will pursue opportunities to actively manage our capital while being responsive to the challenging environment in our local market. Our future capital actions will take into account development in the Puerto Rico fiscal and economic situation. It continues to be our goal to maintain strong capital levels that are appropriate for Popular's risk profile as we work towards our target of a double-digit return on tangible equity.

With that, I turn the call over to Lidio.

Thank you, Carlos, and good morning. Despite Puerto Rico's challenging macroeconomic environment, we are pleased to report stable credit metrics for the corporation highlighted by improvements in our Puerto Rico operations and stability in our US operations. In Puerto Rico, our credit metrics reflect lower net charge-offs, lower NPLs, lower NPL inflows and stable NPAs.

In the US, the classification to nonperforming of one commercial relationship of $11 million impacted the results for the quarter. Except for this relationship, credit metrics in the US were stable during the quarter.

As Richard covered on slide number three, our current outstanding direct exposure to the Puerto Rico government, municipalities and other [instrumentalities] is $565 million, down $30 million from last quarter. Our total outstanding exposure to the central government and public corporations is manageable representing only 1.5% of total Tier 1 capital.

As we have discussed in the past, most of Popular's direct government exposure is in the form of municipal loans and not securities. Our municipality exposure consists of senior priority loans to a select group of municipalities whose revenues are independent of the central government.

Our top four exposures are to Carolina, where the airport and several major tourist hotels are located; San Juan, the capital of Puerto Rico; Graynabo, the municipality with the highest per capita income, and Bayamon, the second most populous municipality. These four municipalities comprise approximately 72% of our total municipality exposure and combined have an operating surplus of $58 million and debt service capacity in excess of 2.2 times. In addition, these municipalities have meaningful sources of liquidity outside of deposits held at GDB.

As discussed in previous earnings calls, we also have indirect lending facilities in which the government acts as a guarantor. The largest such exposure is in the form of residential mortgage loans to individual borrowers in which the government provides a guarantee similar to FHA programs in the US.

Please turn to the next slide to discuss the credit metrics for the quarter. Nonperforming assets including cover loans increased by $5 million to $848 million (sic see slide 7) driven by increase in other real estate owned of $10 million offset in part by an NPL decrease of $2 million.

The OREO increase was mainly driven by the Puerto Rico mortgage portfolio as a result of customized foreclosure activity. Nonperforming loans held in the portfolio decreased $2 million from the fourth quarter of 2015 mainly driven by improvement of $30 million in Puerto Rico offset in part by an increase of US NPLs of $11 million driven by the previously mentioned commercial relationship.

The NPLS improvement in Puerto Rico was mostly driven by lower mortgage NPLs of $15 million coupled with lower consumer NPLs of $3 million. These were partly offset by an increase of $5 million in commercial NPLs. At the end of the first quarter of 2016, NPLs to total loans held in portfolio remained flat at 2.7% compared to the previous quarter.

Please turn to slide number seven to discuss NPL inflows. NPL inflows excluding consumer loans increased by $9 million on a linked quarter basis driven by the $11 million previously mentioned single commercial relationship in the US. In Puerto Rico, NPL inflows decreased by $2 million due to lower mortgage inflows of $7 million offset by an increase of $4 million in the commercial portfolio. NPL inflows in the US increased to $23 million from $12 million last quarter.

Please turn to the next slide. Net charge-offs excluding write-downs amounted to $42 million or annualized 76 basis points of average loans held in portfolio compared to $83 million or 148 basis points in the fourth quarter of 2015. Net charge-offs in the previous quarter were impacted by $31 million in commercial charge-offs in Puerto Rico related to certain borrowers from which specific results were recorded in prior periods.

Excluding this, the net charge-offs declined by $9 million quarter over quarter mainly due to improvement in the Puerto Rico commercial portfolio.

US net charge-offs were $2 million in the first quarter compared to $1 million in the previous quarter. This slight increase was mainly due to lower recoveries. The provision to net charge-off ratio increased 113% from 70% in the previous quarter which included the effect of an NPL portfolio sale and the charge-off from previously reserved loans.

Excluding these effects, the provision to net charge-offs ratio increased from 90% to 113% primarily driven by the Puerto Rico region. In the US, the provision to net charge-off ratio was 226% driven by lower losses coupled with strong portfolio growth in the region.

The corporation allowance for loan losses increased by $5 million from the previous quarter driven by the allowance built up in Puerto Rico. The ratio of allowance for loan losses to loans held in portfolio remained flat at 2.3% this quarter. The ratio of allowance for loan losses to NPLs held in portfolio remained stable at 85%.

These credit metrics stem from our efforts to adjust Popular's current portfolio mix from that at the end of 2007. The corporation has de-risked its loan portfolio by reducing exposure to asset class with historically high loss content. In the US, we no longer have a separate consumer and mortgage business. Our US bank is now a community and niche lender with a much lower risk profile.

Our construction exposure is mainly in New York with experienced developers and proven loan to value ratios. In Puerto Rico, our commercial and construction exposure have decreased from 55% of our total loan book to 43%. Construction lending has decreased 91% and now stands at $105 million.

In addition to a markedly improved risk profile, our 2015 Dodd-Frank stress test results provide us with additional comfort. It incorporated a severely adverse scenario for Puerto Rico in which the unemployment rate peaked at 20.4% and economic activity measured by GMP decreased by 6.3% during the first calendar year.

Under such a scenario while we forecast over 10% loan losses in the nine-quarter period and reflect a 230 basis points impact to our Tier 1 common equity ratio, we maintain a meaningful cushion in excess of well capitalized (inaudible) at all times. In accordance with regulatory requirements, we will file our next DFAST in July of 2016, the results of which will be published in late October.

To summarize, despite difficult conditions in our main market, the corporation asset quality remained stable during the first quarter of 2016. While we remain encouraged by such stability, we also remain cautious on our short-term outlook.

With that I would now like to turn the call over to Richard for his concluding remarks. Thank you.

Thank you, Lidio. And please turn to slide number nine. Before we open the lines to questions, let me conclude today's remarks by reviewing the actions we have been taking to drive shareholder value.

Our healthy revenue generation and our leading market position in Puerto Rico allow us to earn above average margins. We are encouraged by the progress in our US operation and by the strength of our Puerto Rico franchise. Popular's credit risk profile is meaningfully different from that of a few years ago.

In spite of the difficult macro environment, we continue to see stability in our main credit quality indicators while remaining attentive to fiscal and economic trends. This improved credit profile together with our strong capital levels are the anchors of our strategy.

We also benefit from our EVERTEC ownership and our stake in Banco BHD Leon, the second-largest bank in the Dominican Republic. Given the fiscal economic challenges we face on the island, we are focused on the current situation while acting to minimize its risk.

We have managed the bank within this environment for the last 10 years completing several troubled loan sales, refocusing our loan books on lower loss content business lines, raising approximately $2 billion of common equity and completing two end market FDIC assisted acquisitions all while earning positive profits in our Puerto Rico business during the island's prolonged recession.

More recently in the past 24 months, we have repaid close to $1 billion in TARP, had two credit MOUs lifted, restructured our US balance sheet and back office, purchased $2 billion of assets in the Doral transaction and reinstated our common dividend after six years. We will continue to seek additional opportunities in the current environment.

The next few months will be a defining period for Puerto Rico's future. We remain confident that Puerto Rico will emerge from the current challenges with a more vibrant and diversified economy and we will do everything in our power to ensure this outcome.

Throughout its 122-year history, Popular has persevered through a myriad of different challenges on the island. Although our Company is intrinsically linked to Puerto Rico, Popular is also a story of a solid organization that has navigated through a complex environment and has emerged as a stronger, better capitalized and more diversified institution.

We look forward to reporting on our progress in the next few months. With that, I would like to open the call for questions.

(Operator Instructions). Brian Klock, Keefe Bruyette & Woods.

So my first question, so Richard, thinking about this environment and how difficult it is and reading the headlines in the papers here, congratulations on a solid quarter and putting up the strong asset quality, the margin expansion and then solid asset quality. So good work on a solid first quarter.

Thank you, Brian.

So my first question really is Carlos, I'm not sure if I missed it on the guidance but there was seasonality in the expense line but it still came in when you take out the ORE charges in line with your guidance. So how do you feel about keeping the expense in line with your overall expense guidance for the rest of the year?

We confirmed our outlook, Brian, that the expenses, quarterly expenses will average between $305 million and $310 million for the rest of this year.

Okay. So within the personnel expense line that is usually the seasonality in the first quarter so we should see that come down a little bit going forward?

Yes, that is seasonal and if you compare it to what happened in the first quarter last year, it is proportional to what happened last year. It is just the dollar amount is a bit different because the base is a bit different mostly as a result of the addition of Doral.

Okay. And then just a follow-up on that, it seems you have done a pretty good job like I said keeping that expense base flat even with the moving pieces and seasonality. Is there any ability on the professional fees to bring that down? It has been a little bit steady in around the mid-70s in the last four quarters. Is there any room to move that down?

Keep in mind that some of the professional fees are subject to the local taxes in Puerto Rico as well so the fact that the number is flattish actually means that it is slightly down on the core number. We keep hacking at it, Brian. Not all of those are controllable by us as you know, but there's some legal expenses in there as well. We keep working on it.

Just one follow-up again a good solid story in the US franchise. Can you just talk about the loan growth? Seemed like some really good commercial growth and then the non-mortgage consumer maybe you can talk about the growth in the pipeline you've got in the US?

I think we are very happy on the commercial side. There has been a lot of CRE and some multifamily in there as well as specialized lines that we have. So we are very happy with how the operation is growing particularly after the addition of the Doral folks to our team and I think that is paying off. So we are delighted with the performance so far.

Good work and thanks for your time.

Brett Rabatin, Piper Jaffray.

Good morning. Wanted to I guess first, just again like Brian mentioned, nice quarter with the credit quality trends and some other things. I guess I wanted to just ask first on mortgage banking obviously some industry issues with the first quarter there. But does that rebound over the next quarter or so? Can you give me thoughts on mortgage banking?

We think if you compare it to the last quarter, it was fairly flat, down only slightly. It is only when you compare it to a year ago that it is considerably down. Be aware also that the mortgage line or the noninterest line was also affected by the valuation of the MSRs which are tough to predict on that one. I guess we have been seeing in general a slower environment for mortgages and I think that is a reflection of the uncertainty that is in the market that I alluded to earlier in my remarks. But both on the commercial side and on the consumer side people are being a lot more cautious whether it be buying a new house or buying an automobile, people are being a lot more cautious and that is just a reflection of that.

Aside from that, I will tell you that we've probably become a little more disciplined in our pricing in the mortgage area and that is probably costing us some growth but we are happy to let that go.

Okay. And maybe you can talk about some of the balance sheet actions during the quarter, the securities portfolio growth which you guys were buying and mortgage backs and then funding costs were a little higher. Can you maybe talk about that and how it affects the margin going forward?

The securities changes, we are running a pretty liquid balance sheet right now and the securities purchase was more of a movement from cash to better yielding investments so it was more of a tactical move.

With regards to the funding costs, the increase is mostly a reflection of the mix of our funding in our US banks largely and so the mix change a little bit ended up being a touch more expensive but we keep working at that and hopefully we can move that down over time. Of course at the end of the day if rates go up, then we will all see those costs going up but we will wait for that to happen.

Is it fair to assume the margin holds at the present level to what you've done in the first quarter?

The pressure that affects our margins haven't changed. We have a Westernbank portfolio running up which is a high-margin portfolio. If you look at the levels and yields in the press release, you will see that we have been pretty good at holding and maintaining margins or increasing margins in most of our business lines so, so far it looks like it is in the same ballpark but it will depend on where market rates go obviously. That may be the big delta here.

Okay, great. Thanks for the color.

Jesus Bueno, Compass Point.

Good morning and thanks for taking my questions. I noted the solid NIM and you noted the benefit of the rate increase in December. My question is I guess related to deposits. I guess how has deposit activity been I guess relative to your expectation ahead of the rate increase?

I think we have seen quite a bit of deposit growth in the last quarter and particularly the last few weeks so we are seeing some growth locally in the market, in the more core deposit area. So we are really not out there chasing funds by any stretch of the imagination.

And pricing wise, I guess there hasn't been any pressure yet on pricing?

Yes, no.

Back to mortgage, you noted -- if you could just do me a favor and break out -- I mean you noted the MSR market and I know there was also kind of a trading account gains and also (multiple speakers)?

The MSR market was I think $6 million compared to zero in the fourth quarter, a delta of six.

And I guess the trading out account gains offset the gain on sale incomes. Because the gain on sale income looked actually fairly strong relative to last quarter. It looks like there is about that $3 million offset. Can you explain I guess what impacts it looks like it was hedging, but I guess is that the rate movement that impacted that line?

This is Juan Pablo, the Treasurer. There is some timing differences between when you close a loan that is in your pipeline you end up closing and you sell it forward using hedging vehicles. Right now the loans are accounted for on lower cost of market. We did have a decline in rates between December and March so you did have a hit on the hedge and not necessarily offset because the loans were closed but not necessarily securitized yet. There could be some timing differences there.

Okay, great, but not necessarily that these things will repeat next quarter, correct?

It could be up or down but generally speaking, we do economic hedges on all of our closed loans so we try to maintain our margin over time steady.

And lastly, if you could just give an update on the -- there has been a lot of attention about medallion books recently. So if you could just provide us with an update on the UPB and also where you have it marked at as well, the book?

We'll let Lidio take that one.

In terms of our taxi medallion, we acquired from the Doral portfolio of approximately $245 million of taxi medallions of which based on our fair value process, we booked them around $0.61, $0.62 on the dollar, so they are on our books at approximately $150 million. When you look at the price on a per medallion basis, that deal is about $200,000 per medallion, the book value of our medallion book.

That's great. And do you have the percentage of the book that is still accruing?

This was done on purchase accounting so the majority of the portfolio will be on an accrual basis because of purchase accounting rules. (multiple speakers)

That is great. That is all the questions I have. Congrats on the quarter. Thanks for taking the questions.

Gerard Cassidy, RBC Capital.

Thank you. Good morning, Richard. Good morning, Carlos. Richard, maybe you can start. When you guys look at the return of capital and you laid it out very clearly what you've done in the past, a number of items and giving capital back to shareholders or paying off TARP, etc.

As you go forward, obviously the dividend was declared in the second half of last year, how should we look at you revisiting increasing the dividend, maybe doing a buyback? Is that going to be done annually or more frequently? I know you are not required by CCAR or anything like that but what is your thinking on that?

I think as Lidio mentioned, we will file the results of our stress test in late June some time, July 1, sorry. We will file it in July, we will probably have a better clearer picture certainly of the Puerto Rico situation and how the new stress test impacts our capital. And then we will have some capital actions there depending on the results of that. So that is what we are looking at. We don't anticipate doing anything before that is out.

Thank you. And then obviously you talked about the situation with the government and what is going on in the economy. I think Moody's came out on Friday expecting the government not to be able to pay off -- make all the payments that are scheduled in May. Can you share with us just from a kind of on the street operational standpoint if the government doesn't make the required payments in May, what happens? Can you give us any color on is it business as usual for everybody or do people stop receiving some transfer payments from the government?

I don't think it is business as usual what I would characterize it at. It is public knowledge that most of the operational accounts that were at the Government Development Bank have been transferred into the private banking sector so from that point of view, we don't anticipate any change in terms of transfer payments not getting received or any of that. There would be certainly some impact to investors that hold these bonds and that will have a non-trivial impact on those investors, many of which are local.

So we will see how that plays out. Our understanding is that they are having some types of negotiations and our understanding is that the plan is to continue to pay interest that the moratorium would be on a principal payment, not on continuing to pay interest payments. But we will know a week from today.

Sure. In the growth that you guys identified for Popular in North America or NA, you mentioned in the press release that that included consumer loan portfolio purchases of $85.7 million. What were those?

Those were [peer-to-peer] personal loans that we have purchased from Lending Club.

And do you find the yields in that portfolio are higher than what you can garner yourself?

When you factor in the cost of setting up the operation, yes, at least in the US.

Okay, and you guys give us very good detail on the (multiple speakers).

This is our normal process, we set up our underwriting criteria, these are things that fit our underwriting criteria. So it is (inaudible) that we originated them ourselves but (inaudible).

Thank you. One question on credit, you give us very good detail on the inflows of nonperforming loans and I noticed that for the total number when you go back four or five quarters, it has been moving up and down more towards the downside. But within that category, your residential mortgage has steadily declined since first quarter of 2015. Can you share with us how -- are you managing that portfolio more aggressively because of the concerns of what is going on in Puerto Rico to get that downward trend of new inflows on residential mortgage?

I think that is somewhat contingent in some of our collection practices, we will be more proactive with our client base so yes.

And then finally, Lidio, and I apologize if you discussed this, can you give us more color on that commercial credit that moved into nonperforming in the quarter from the US? Was that a commercial real estate loan or mortgage?

It was a commercial loan. It was -- it finished construction loans. We are in the process of -- or the client is in the process of determining whether he is going to sell or rent the [unit].

Thank you.

Ken Zerbe, Morgan Stanley.

Thank you. Good morning. First question I had, just in terms of the indirect government exposure, it looks like it went up about $23 million. Can you just kind of walk through the thought process just given all the concern in the market right now about the government, what is the thought process behind increasing this exposure?

Those were some loans we acquired. Some mortgage loans happened to have a government guarantee and therefore are included in that indirect exposure. I will tell you we paid less than par for the loans and the loans we did not take into consideration, the government guaranteed when we did the underwriting for that portfolio purchase.

Perfect. Okay, that helps. And just the other question, in terms of capital, obviously the Basel III phase-in adjustments hit capital a little bit this quarter. Are there any other adjustments or phase-ins that are coming due over the next couple of years that could potentially reduce your capital further?

So the phasing effect for Basel becomes effective on January 1 over the next two more years, 2017 and 2018. In the very first of the year we will see some additional phase-in amounts that impact how much of our DTA is allowed in the capital base. One of the biggest impacts in the quarter related to the treatment of TruPS out the common equity Tier 1 -- I'm sorry -- out of Tier 1 into the total capital ratio. That is something that is fully embedded as of January 1, 2016.

So nothing else for the rest of this year, there will be another smaller effect at the beginning of next year.

Got you. And are you able to quantify the potential full impact of all of the phase-ins over the next two years given your existing portfolio?

In the past we disclosed fully phased-in pro forma Basel III results. Obviously how we utilize our DTAs over time with income and the changes in the composition of the risk-weighted assets will have an impact on the overall calculation of Basel III. Maybe [for the Q] (inaudible).

We will refresh that calculation.

Okay, thank you.

Alex Twerdahl, Sandler O'Neill.

Good morning, guys. First off, Lidio, I was wondering if you can give us a little bit more color on trends that you have seen in early stage delinquencies perhaps at the end of the quarter versus year-end and sort of how that bucket has trended through 2015 as well?

In terms of since the end last quarter, you will see when we post the Q, you will see actually a significant decrease in the [3029 bucket] in our Puerto Rico business. It is going to go down by approximately $150 million. It is going from $814 million to $660 million.

That number if you look back to 2015, that has been around in the quarter, it has between sitting at between $640 million to $680 million. So the number that will show up for the first quarter will be right in line with the middle of the quarter that we had for all of 2015 except for the fourth quarter of this year.

And in the US, I will say it is slightly higher even by certain relationships in the US but not significantly.

Thank you. And then secondly, you mentioned that the $86 million of consumer loans that were purchased were from Lending Clubs. Are those national loans or are those all concentrated in the New York or Florida markets?

They are national loans.

And can you give us what the criteria is? I know you have a lot of excess capital in North America and you are looking for uses for it. Can you give us sort of what the criteria is for further loan purchases? Is there a specific criteria or is it purely opportunistic or just a little bit more on what might interest you guys as a use of some of that excess capital?

I would say we are looking at -- from the standpoint I mean this is obviously a channel that is growing the US so we are making a test understanding the dynamics of the market. And we are being a little bit opportunistic but we will continue to test and then evaluate whether this makes sense for a continued purchase or not.

Okay, thank you very much.

Joe Gladue, Marion Capital Group.

Good morning. Wanted to I guess just dig a little bit deeper into some of the NIM yield numbers. Just noticed both on commercial and consumer loan portfolios that the yields are up about 20 basis points or more versus the fourth quarter. Just wondering if you would give a little more detail on what is driving that? Are you issuing loans at higher than average yields, higher than average?

A good chunk of that change was a change in the prime rate that happened in late December. So you didn't see it in the results in the fourth quarter but we you will see it in the results of the first quarter.

And just I guess a broader question in regards to the efforts to solve the government debt crisis. It looks like part of that resolution whenever it occurs or in what pieces it occurs it seems to -- like it will involve enhancing revenues, you are going to see increases in electric rates for both consumers and businesses. Just wondering how you are viewing what impact that will have both in terms of credit quality and loan demand in Puerto Rico?

The devil is in the details at the end of the day. We think that that PREPA deal makes sense and don't think that the impact will be very big. So we are in favor of that one naturally. The rest is let's see if we get some legislation out of committee and onto the floor of the Congress and what finally emerges from that before we make a comment.

We do think in general some path to resolution will be positive. We obviously have our opinions as to what should be in there. We are not seeing much in the way of economic growth and that has been something that we feel is extremely important. Right now there is a lot of jockeying to see what kind of resolution mechanisms are put in and different classes of bondholders are obviously having some input into that process. We will see what emerges before we can get you a better reaction to that.

On the electricity, keep in mind that a lot of the reports are reporting increases from where we are today but even with those increases we will probably have lower electric prices than we had a year, two years ago so still a net contribution to the economy even during those payloads.

Thank you. That is fair enough.

Absolutely, thanks.

Brian Horey, Aurelian.

I wondered if you could give us any more granular detail on your taxi portfolio, debt service coverage ratios, number of TDRs, number in foreclosure, that kind of thing?

We have provided that type of disclosure that is something that we will look at and maybe provide in the 10-Q. But I will give you the color that we have given in the past. This is mostly again as I said earlier today, it was a portfolio that we acquired from Doral. It is mostly a New York based portfolio with 94% of our exposure in New York City.

As I mentioned before, given the purchase accounting and fair value exercise we have in our books at close to $0.61, $0.62 to the dollar which is if you look at only New York is about $400,000 per medallion. As to additional disclosure, we will consider that and maybe provide that in future disclosures.

On the Q.

Have you had any go to nonaccrual since you acquired the portfolio?

We have had a number of discussions with our borrowers. We have restructured some of our relationships as far as that process. Some of them may have fallen behind in terms of their payments prior to their restructuring.

Okay.

Again the most important is that we have it reflected in our books at a proper fair value and that they are being accounted under purchase accounting or SOP accounting.

And most of your New York medallions are they the mini fleet or the independent medallions that are behind the loans?

Most of them are mini fleet actually.

Okay, thank you.

Brian Klock.

Thanks for taking my follow-up, guys. I just wanted to, Richard, I wanted to ask you about the return of capital discussion earlier and I think you said that you'd probably wait on any capital actions until after the DFAST. Is that what -- ?

Yes. (multiple speakers) We will wait -- we will probably have a better feel for it after the DFAST and certainly the Puerto Rico situation should be a lot clearer. So we will probably wait until that part of the year before we take any capital action.

Is it possible, I guess there is so much that has to come to a head here with the July 1 payments after the DDB's payments. I mean if there is something becomes clearer in early July, would that change anything?

No, I think we will still wait to submit our DFAST and get a better feel for how we feel the environment is evolving.

Okay. Thanks for taking my question. Thank you.

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