Guaranty Bancshares Inc (GNTY) 2022 Q4 法說會逐字稿

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  • Nona Branch - Executive Administrative Officer

  • Good morning, and welcome to Guaranty Bancshares' fourth-quarter 2022 earnings call. My name is Nona Branch, and I will be your operator for today's call. This call is being recorded. After the prepared remarks, there will be a Q&A session.

  • Our host for today's call will be Ty Abston, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the company; Cappy Payne, Senior Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of the company; Shalene Jacobson, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of the bank.

  • To begin our call, I will now turn it over to our CEO, Ty Abston.

  • Ty Abston - Chairman & CEO

  • Thank you, Nona. Good morning, everyone. Again, welcome to our fourth quarter earnings call for Guaranty Bancshares. We did have a year that we're very proud of. Our quarter did have some noise in it that we're going to go over and explain in our presentation. And then we're going to talk a little bit about our projections for 2023. We'll get into our slide deck and go through that, and then we'll open it up for Q&A.

  • So Cappy, why don't you start that?

  • Cappy Payne - Senior EVP and CFO

  • Okay. Thank you, Ty. Let's briefly hit some of the highlights of the balance sheet first, then I'll go over the income statement. We do have some of those highlights on the slide deck here if you're looking on your PC. Our total assets for the year ended at $3.4 billion. That was down for the quarter about $39 million. But it is up for the year, $265 million.

  • Lot of that came from an increase in loans. We had a really good year in loan growth. We were up for the quarter, $112 million. This is ex-PPP and warehouse lending. And for the year we were up $553 million, about 30%.

  • And looking at some of the details of that, we did have growth in all four of our regions. So we're proud of that and do have emphasis in activity in all four of those regions. You can see in the earnings release, we do list a loan composition chart. And of course, most of that loan growth is real estate based. And again, you can see the components being CRE, construction, development, and so forth.

  • On the bond portfolio, it did show a decrease during the quarter, like we told you last earnings release, we had about $120 million in treasuries, short-term trade treasuries that matured. They were at a pretty low rate. So actually the yield on the portfolio increased, but the volume was down about $133 million for the quarter. Year to date though, our year-end balances were up about $175 million year over year in the bond portfolio.

  • Then looking at the liability side, probably the notable change, obviously is what people are looking at in deposits. We did have a deposit decrease during the quarter of $109 million, about $89 million of that, the large largest majority was in non-interest bearing DDA balances and about $20 million in interest-bearing balances.

  • Some of that was just -- we knew some of that was coming as just a restructure and then just a positioning of some funds that got invested elsewhere. I'll talk a little bit about some of the costs related to that, but kind of a comment on there. We normally see public fund money increase during the fourth quarter. We did see it increase just not as much as normal.

  • And probably that's indicative of what we're seeing a lot of our customers at least being faced with is alternative investment rates on other investments. Public fund money is most of it's contracted at a certain rate and a lot of what they're seeing was a lot higher than what they -- what our contracted rate is. So some of that money went elsewhere.

  • Again, our public fund money is not a large part of our deposits, about 11%, $300 million over on our $2.7 billion in total deposits. But I think it's just kind of just to show you what we're all seeing in the banking world as far as competition. Our year-to-date deposits were up about $10 million and our DDA balances actually were up $38 million in total year over year. So non-interest-bearing balances still account for 39% of our total deposits, which again helps in that funding cost.

  • Our Federal Home Loan Bank borrowings did increase for the quarter. That's going to be driven mainly by that loan growth and some deposit decrease during fourth quarter. And it year end, they were $290 million in total fundings from Federal Home Loan Bank. Our shareholder equity increased, obviously in the quarter due to earnings offset by the dividend that we did pay, we paid another $0.22 cash dividend.

  • We also did have a slight improvement in our accumulated other comprehensive income, which is the unrealized loss in our bond portfolio. So our tangible common equity ended the year at a ratio of 7.87%, down a little bit during the year due to that significant increase in the unrealized loss on our bond portfolio, the accumulated other comprehensive income.

  • The $0.22 dividend that we paid during the quarter made a total of $0.88 for the year. That's up 10% year over year. And looking back at our history, we've got about a 30 year-plus history of increasing annual dividend. I think all but two years of those 30 years-plus, we did not increase it.

  • Every other year, we increased it. Those two years, we just left them flat. We did not decrease. But we didn't increase them. And that $0.88 dividend based on current yield is about -- based on current price is about a 2.5% yield on that return.

  • Then looking over at the income statement, you see our fourth quarter net earnings were $8 million, which was down from the previous three quarters. That $8 million is $0.67 per share. That decrease or the significant event during the quarter was related to a provision that we made of $2.8 million due to our CECL modelling.

  • Shalene will give you a little more detail on that in just a minute. So I will not talk to detail on it. But because of that, that event, if you look at our pre-provision, pre-tax, pre-PPP activity, which is our net core earnings. We've been putting this chart in there each quarter for the last two years and you'll see that our quarterly earnings pre-provision, pre-tax were $12.6 million for the quarter.

  • Our year to date was $50.2 million, and that compares from previous year fourth quarter, $10 million and previous year, 2021 of $39 million. So year over year, that's about $11.2 million increase, which is 29%, so then looking at our year to date, return on average assets and again on net earnings were 1.24% stated earnings, 1.24% for 2022, for the year compared to 1.36% for 2021.

  • Again, a significant factor in that the change would be the difference in the 2022 provision that we made versus the 2021 release that we did with those two components were a swing of about $3.9 million. Return on average equity for the year was 13.76% compared to 13.72% in 2021. Again, we had really good earnings this past year. We're proud of the year, we did and both these two years, 2022 and 2021, the net earnings were significantly higher than previous years.

  • So then looking at the components, I think what everyone's focused on is our net interest margin in Q4. It was -- it did show a decrease of 2 basis points. It was 3.57% down from 3.59% in linked quarter, but up from the same quarter last year of 18 basis points. Loan yields are increasing nicely as rates are rising and we talk about that in the earnings release. Shalene will again talk some more detail on that and what the rates are currently doing.

  • But I think probably more of the focused attention is on our cost of interest-bearing deposits, probably. Some we look at all the time and made some decisions on this quarter that we're not exactly what we had projected. It didn't affect as mini banks, though. So we did see that outflow of deposits.

  • And to remain competitive, we increased our cost of interest-bearing deposits for the quarter more than we had projected that we would -- we thought we were going to do prior to the quarter. The cost of interest-bearing deposits for the quarter were 108 basis points. In Q4, that's up from 59 basis points in Q3, significant increase.

  • But those are some decisions we made to remain competitive in the various markets that we're in. And we're seeing all sorts of competition, both in small bank and big and larger banks and then to protect our existing core deposit base. I think we put in the press release, our interest-bearing cost of deposits beta increased 40% during the quarter, which is significantly higher because we made those decisions both in increasing some CD rates and our money market rates more than what we had projected.

  • I guess a note to point out when used in our non-interest-bearing balances, the total cost of funds is 64 basis points. Again, we put that in the earnings release as up from 35 basis points linked quarter. So the -- so that would make a total deposit beta increased 23%. And looking at non-interest income, it still remains lower than what we saw in 2021 and the first half of 2022.

  • If you look -- if you take out the extraordinary items, Q3 and Q4 were very consistent with each other. I think we're going to continue to have challenges in our non-interest income category back certainly last year when the loan -- the mortgage rates were lower, we had a lot more gain on sale. If we look at year over year, our gain on sale in '22 was 55% lower than it was in '21 as about a $3 million swing. So we're projecting the lower volume going forward in mortgage activity and related fee income, as we look at 2023.

  • We did have some positive trends other than that on the non-interest income, though. The debit card volume continues to increase and show good volumes. And our fiduciary income is pretty stable, even in an unsteady stock market that we've experienced in the last half of 2022. On our expense side, we did have a little bit of elevated expenses in Q4, which sometimes traditionally we do.

  • We -- each year -- and how we give raises in the fourth quarter, starting in the first part of the fourth quarter in October as we did this year, when they're warranted, they were generally higher, the raises were generally higher this year than what we've seen in prior years, obviously due to inflation. And really just the competitive pressures that we're seeing in some staff positions.

  • Our healthcare costs this year as we told you in prior quarters, up a little bit this year over last year. So we had a little bit of catch up in Q4 to be properly funded for it. And then the other category that you'll notice in there is our software, our technology.

  • We're constantly looking at our software providers and opportunity and we did make some upgrades in our core and other systems that added some cost in that category. So that's a recap of the income statement. So I'll turn it over to Shalene.

  • Shalene Jacobson - EVP & CFO

  • Thank you, Cappy. Next, I'll cover some of the highlights of our loan portfolio, credit quality, and the allowance for credit losses. As Cappy mentioned, our loan demand continued to be strong in the fourth quarter because loans in the pipeline from earlier in 2020 to continue to close and fund up during the quarter.

  • But our pipeline is certainly slowing down now, partially because of the higher rates, but also because we're really tapping the brakes on growth as we prepare for a likely downturn in the near future. As you all know, the Texas economy is still doing relatively well, but we aren't totally immune to downturns either.

  • Therefore, we're tightening our underwriting standards and really being conservative with balance sheet growth for 2023. And Ty will provide a few more thoughts on the loan outlook for 2023 on the next slide in a few minutes.

  • Overall, our loan yields are trending upwards. Our weighted average loan yield increased this quarter to 5.2% on the total portfolio, which is up from 4.96% in the third quarter. But the weighted average rate of new loan originations in the fourth quarter was 6.53%, which is 88 basis points higher than the weighted average rate of 5.65, that was booked in the third quarter. And then in December after the additional Fed hikes, we've been booking loans closer to the 7.5% rate on average.

  • Our next bullet talks a bit about rate sensitivity of our loans. We have around $1.5 billion of loans that are fully floating or that are adjustable at various dates in the future.. Of the $1.5 billion, $256 million is fully floating, and the rest is adjustable at future dates. Of the $1.3 billion, that's adjustable at future dates, about $213 million of that is contractually set to adjust during 2023, along again with the $256 million of fully floating loans.

  • Non-performing assets continue to remain relatively low at 0.32% compared to 0.28% in the prior quarter. A large portion of our non-performing assets, which are primarily non-accrual loans consisted the four loans I've mentioned in prior quarters that were acquired from Westbound Bank back in 2018. Those four loans are 75% SBA-guaranteed and they're collateralized by two loans or two hotels in Houston.

  • The loans have total balances of $6.7 million, of which our non-guaranteed exposure is $1.7 million, and we've got about $1 million reserved on those. We don't really expect there to be any material loss. If there is any loss on those, we continue to work through those problem loans.

  • And then we also have a new $1.4 million land loan that was downgraded to non-accrual during the fourth quarter. The loan has low LTV, and we expect the guarantors, who we believe are pretty strong to pay us that loan in the very near future. So we don't expect any losses on that one either.

  • And our net charge-offs and net charge-offs to average loans ratio also continued to be very low this quarter. And next up is the allowance for credit losses. As Cappy mentioned, we had a $2.8 million provision for credit losses during the fourth quarter. We also had a $600,000 provision in Q3. We didn't have any provision in Q2. And we had a $1.25 million release in the first quarter. So interesting how much contingent in a year, but the total provision expense for 2022 ended up being $2.15 million for the year.

  • So in addition to the loan growth during the quarter, we adjusted our CECL model to incorporate economic forecasts for a recession during 2023. In the fourth quarter, there appeared to be consensus among economists that a recession would occur. And there was even a survey that was published by the Wall Street Journal back in October that cited 65% of the economists that they surveyed who expected a recession.

  • So that consensus in the fourth quarter among other factors that we looked at provided us with greater support for adjusting our forecasts as well. However, we've historically had very minimal losses in prior downturns. And we really don't anticipate any significant losses during this potential downturn either. Our ACL coverage was 1.34% of total loan at the end of the quarter compared to 1.29% in the prior quarter.

  • So next, I will turn it over to Ty to talk about 2023 and asset liability management.

  • Ty Abston - Chairman & CEO

  • So thanks, Shalene. So for the coming year, like we've been saying we're anticipating slower growth. The loan growth we had in fourth quarter really was -- those are credits primarily that were for the first half of '22 that have been funding other equity portion. So that's really the majority of that. We are seeing a slower pipeline in '23, as we would expect.

  • Like Shalene said, our state is overall doing well. But it's going to slow here like every other part of the country. We are seeing deposit challenges. We do -- big part of our models is we do have a strong core deposit base. But like everyone else, we're having to compete with the market. And we're in markets where banks are paying pretty aggressive rates, while we're not leading that.

  • We're certainly defending our core deposits because lot of depositors, quite frankly, have been earning next to nothing last few years and are ready to get some yield. And they're also looking at what the treasury market is offering. And so we've seen a lot of liquidity being pulled out of the system, just in the treasury market where people are moving in treasuries that normally wouldn't.

  • So we expect some net interest margin compression in '23. We think it's manageable, but we just -- it makes sense to us and we're going to continue to see that as we continue to reprice loans. But we also see our liabilities and deposits cost us more. We did have good earnings in '22. As we mentioned, our goal when we started the year was to try to improve on '21 because '21 had $5 million or $6 million extraordinary income.

  • Once we saw, we looped that. And we felt it was prudent to go ahead and look at our factors in our CECL model going into '23. And so that's what we did in the last quarter. And like Shalene said, we do think that it's a real strength that our ALCI is very manageable.

  • And not only where we are today, but also even where we would look -- what we would look like and chuck an additional 100 basis points and 150 basis points increase in rates, very manageable, which means our capital continues to be very strong. I'll stop with that, and then we'll open up for questions.

  • Nona Branch - Executive Administrative Officer

  • Thank you, Ty. It is now time for our Q&A session of our call. Michael Rose, Raymond James.

  • Michael Rose - Analyst

  • Hi. Thanks. Can you hear me?

  • Ty Abston - Chairman & CEO

  • Yes. Hey, Michael.

  • Michael Rose - Analyst

  • Good morning. Thanks for taking my questions. Hope you're well and Happy New Year. Just wanted to obviously dig into the deposit discussion, I understand that the cost of interest-bearing deposits were certainly up. Do you have a sense for what they were at the end of the year?

  • And then kind of as a corollary to that, kind of what gives you confidence that you can expect balances to be stabilized to maybe have some slight pressure here? I mean, would you expect to fill with some higher cost funding sources, just given kind of the pressure on betas and costs and things like that? And just wanted to get some context there. Thanks.

  • Ty Abston - Chairman & CEO

  • Well, I'll talk about the deposit balance, Michael. I think what we're seeing and we're putting emphasis on our high comp with our production people is do focus more on deposits and loans. I think we're still out there trying to grow our deposits and gain customer, a bigger customer base. So I think we'll continue to have challenges with the runoff.

  • Sure that we talked about with either alternative investment or increased funding cost because they put the money into a CD or something that they hadn't been in the last year. But our emphasis will continue to be on our production people to go out there and get more customers.

  • Cappy Payne - Senior EVP and CFO

  • Yes, Mike, I would just to add that. I mean, we're like every bank, I mean, we're seeing real pressure on the deposit side. We do have a core funding source in East Texas, but we're seeing deposit pressure out there, too. It is still various. We still have a very stable deposit platform. And we've been playing somewhat defensive with our rates.

  • But this fourth quarter, we decided to be a little more aggressive in trying to get in front of it. So we think we've slowed that down, but we still have quite a bit of our deposit base, nearly 40% in DDA. So non-maturing deposits continue to be a strong part of our overall deposit structure.

  • But we're going to defend our core relationships because a lot of it is just the reality that customers haven't seen any yield in three or four years and they're looking for it. And so even if you have core -- a strong core funding base, you're going to have real headwinds when it comes to your funding cost with everything going on in the velocity of increase in rates that we've seen the last few months.

  • Michael Rose - Analyst

  • Okay. And then maybe just kind of a follow-up to that. The margin was down a little bit Q on Q, but it seems like with maybe some of the other balance sheet actions, even with the deposit pressure that you would expect the margin to maybe move up a few basis points because the slide reached plateau in the second quarter and then maybe fall from there. Just directionally, is that kind of the way we should broadly be thinking about it?

  • Ty Abston - Chairman & CEO

  • That's generally what we're thinking, Michael. I think I will hold off a little bit on some details on that going forward, just because we don't know the extent of how we're going to react with rate changes in the next few months too.

  • Michael Rose - Analyst

  • Okay. And then maybe just one more for me. I think we can kind of figure out what the expenses are based on, the expense to asset guide, but just on the fee income, obviously some greater headwinds you guys have talked about it. I believe it's in the range of $22 million to $23 million to $24 million for fee income next quarter.

  • But it sounds like it's going to be a little bit less than that, just given some of the market pressures and other things that you mentioned in your prepared remarks, do you have kind of an updated range for what that could be for 2023? Thanks.

  • Cappy Payne - Senior EVP and CFO

  • I think we're going to be in the 22 to 23 range on fee income. That is what we have budgeted going forward.

  • Michael Rose - Analyst

  • Okay. I'll step back. Thanks for taking my questions.

  • Ty Abston - Chairman & CEO

  • Sure. Thanks, Michael.

  • Nona Branch - Executive Administrative Officer

  • Brady Gailey, KBW.

  • Brady Gailey - Analyst

  • Hey. Good morning, guys.

  • Ty Abston - Chairman & CEO

  • Hi, Brady.

  • Cappy Payne - Senior EVP and CFO

  • Hi, Brady.

  • Brady Gailey - Analyst

  • I just wanted to start with the expense base. Your guidance of 2.5% of assets is basically where you were at in the fourth quarter. And you're not expecting much asset growth in 2023, so that kind of backs into flat expenses versus the 4Q run rate, which I don't know, maybe seems a little optimistic just given the inflation headwinds. But is that the right way to think about it? Maybe expenses will be flat from here in dollars.

  • Cappy Payne - Senior EVP and CFO

  • From Q4, yes, Brady, I think that's where we're looking at in 2023 based on no -- or certainly a lot less growth in assets. So at 2.5, we're comfortable with the 2.5% guidance.

  • Ty Abston - Chairman & CEO

  • But Brady, let me add this to that. I mean, across the board, we see headwinds with our expenses. We see headwinds with fee income and with NIM. And I think that's pretty universal, in my opinion, with what banks are going to be faced with in '23. And it'll be up to us to go through that and create a good return.

  • But there's headwinds really in all of those key areas of our balance sheet and income statement. So that's where we're a little less optimistic as far as just projecting that where things are going to land in '23 because of the unknowns with where these rates are going, how they're going to settle out.

  • Brady Gailey - Analyst

  • Okay, all right. And then I know you've made some changes in your restructure pieces of mortgage and SBA and fee income. Is there anything notably different that we'll see out of those two segments this year. I know both are facing headwinds. But I know you've restructured both of those groups, anything we should expect in that for this year?

  • Ty Abston - Chairman & CEO

  • Nothing specific. It's just going to be a tough year for both those areas.

  • Brady Gailey - Analyst

  • Yes. All right. Great. Thanks, guys.

  • Ty Abston - Chairman & CEO

  • Sure. Thanks, Brady.

  • Nona Branch - Executive Administrative Officer

  • Matt Olney, Stephens.

  • Matt Olney - Analyst

  • Hey, thanks. Good morning, everybody.

  • Ty Abston - Chairman & CEO

  • Good morning, Matt.

  • Nona Branch - Executive Administrative Officer

  • All right, Matt.

  • Matt Olney - Analyst

  • Can you hear me now?

  • Ty Abston - Chairman & CEO

  • Yes, we can hear you.

  • Matt Olney - Analyst

  • Okay, great, Thanks. Cappy, I think you mentioned previously there were some treasuries that matured in the fourth quarter. Any more color on when those matured, was it kind of throughout the quarter or was it weighted towards the front half or back half? And then what was the average yield on those treasuries that matured in the fourth quarter?

  • Cappy Payne - Senior EVP and CFO

  • Shalene, do you have that? I think you might have that in front of you.

  • Shalene Jacobson - EVP & CFO

  • We had $70 million mature on November 30; and another $20 million, I believe that matured on November 24. I don't have the yields in front of me, but I can get that to you.

  • Ty Abston - Chairman & CEO

  • They were pretty low (multiple speakers) first year.

  • Cappy Payne - Senior EVP and CFO

  • That was really short-term treasuries bought in the first [half] of the year. So yes, I think it will be a low yield.

  • Matt Olney - Analyst

  • Okay. And I think in that deck, you also talked about more securities maturing in 2023. Anymore color on that, is it throughout the year kind of consistently? Or is it weighted towards the front half or back half of the year?

  • Shalene Jacobson - EVP & CFO

  • The treasuries are weighted towards the front half of the year. I believe they're about $50 million. I'm pulling that up though, so I can let you guys know if you have another question in the meantime.

  • Matt Olney - Analyst

  • Okay.

  • Ty Abston - Chairman & CEO

  • But the dollar amount she's referring to there though in the deck is throughout the year.

  • Matt Olney - Analyst

  • Got it. Okay. Well, I guess shift over to loan growth, I guess, to buy Shalene some time here. But on the long -- the long --

  • Shalene Jacobson - EVP & CFO

  • Sorry, I was able to pull it up real quick. So we've got $50 million in treasuries that are maturing in March, April, and May, and then another $20 million in September. And the ones that matured in November, the yield on one was 0.666 and the other was 0.880.

  • Cappy Payne - Senior EVP and CFO

  • There were, yes, low yields.

  • Matt Olney - Analyst

  • Got it. Okay, that's helpful, Shalene. Thank you for that.

  • Shalene Jacobson - EVP & CFO

  • Welcome.

  • Matt Olney - Analyst

  • And then the loan growth that we talked about before, just anymore color, should we assume the loan growth is going to be stronger in the front half of the year versus the back half versus what you see right now? You mentioned kind of intentional slowing of that from some of your borrowers. Just even more color on kind of the pace of that throughout the year.

  • Cappy Payne - Senior EVP and CFO

  • I think that's fair to look at it that way, Matt, is that the loan growth that we have would be probably the first half of the year and be slight to a possible decline in the second half of the year is dependent on how things play out.

  • Matt Olney - Analyst

  • Okay. And then just I'm also curious about your strategy around the FHLB advance. I think it's $2.9 million, sounds like you could kind of maintain that balance for a while, but would love to appreciate maybe the puts and takes and kind of what's in the budget versus, you know, different options that you could see throughout the year on that?

  • Ty Abston - Chairman & CEO

  • Well, it'll depend on the timing of any type of loan or deposit change. But again, as we said in there, we got a $100 million-plus in bonds rolling off. The FHLB, we're just using a short term catch all. And I think that rate at dollar amount will stay pretty consistent to decreasing a little bit throughout the year. And we just keep it on a short-term basis.

  • Matt Olney - Analyst

  • Yes. Okay. Thanks, guys. Appreciate your help.

  • Ty Abston - Chairman & CEO

  • Thanks, Matt.

  • Nona Branch - Executive Administrative Officer

  • Brad Milsaps, Piper Sandler.

  • Brad Milsaps - Analyst

  • Hey, good morning. Am I coming through?

  • Ty Abston - Chairman & CEO

  • Yes, Brad. Yes, good morning.

  • Brad Milsaps - Analyst

  • You guys have addressed almost everything. I apologize if I missed this, but just curious, Cappy, I know you didn't buy back any shares during this quarter. You're more active earlier in the year, given kind of lack of balance sheet growth. Any more appetite or is it still kind of kind of a wait-and-see approach there?

  • Cappy Payne - Senior EVP and CFO

  • Pretty much a wait and see, Brad. We have a metric we're looking at and we'll get in the market, and we think it's a prudent, but we were not there during Q4. So we didn't have any shares, but actually we bought back was 250,000 shares, I believe, for the year. So we keep our same metrics out there, but we will just have a wait-and-see attitude.

  • Brad Milsaps - Analyst

  • Got it. And then maybe sort of a bigger picture question for Ty. I know last year, your goal was to earn basically a dollar more in 2022 than you did in '21. And you guys did that, had a great year. I think everyone knows that '23 is going to be more challenging. But just kind of curious what you would -- maybe not so much in net income dollars, but kind of where do you want to see the bank 12 months from now?

  • I know it's a pretty murky picture, but kind of what would you classify as a successful year for Guaranty? Is it just sort of getting to the other side of this with a bigger capital base, a bigger reserve just ready to take whatever the economy grows, just kind of curious, you know, if you could give us kind of a bigger picture outlook, maybe similar to what you did in '22?

  • Ty Abston - Chairman & CEO

  • Yes, Brad, I would say that I mean, our main goal in '23 is to be to really have strong asset quality come through this cycle without any significant losses. We're going to be built reserves as we see, it's prudent to have good earnings. We'll see what that actually turns into because like I said there's headwinds across the board, but the other side of this have stronger capital, stronger reserves, and maintain strong asset quality to be positioned to go back on offense when things start going the other direction.

  • But it's going to be very much a defensive year for us, at least I think probably a lot of banks as we're really trying to defend our core funding base, really defending asset quality, and trying to defend earnings and from just the different expense structures that have been under pressure the last couple of years and obviously fee income. So across the board, it's going to be a year that our goal will be to be in a better place than we are today and that same log onto a what could be an economic downturn in the storm.

  • Brad Milsaps - Analyst

  • That's helpful. Thank you, guys. Appreciate all the color.

  • Ty Abston - Chairman & CEO

  • Sure, Brad.

  • Nona Branch - Executive Administrative Officer

  • We have another question from Matt Olney.

  • Matt Olney - Analyst

  • Hey, Thanks, thanks for the follow up. Just sticking with this bigger picture thing, Ty, I guess, the bank has been able to maintain this return on assets above 1% now for a number of years. You mentioned all the headwinds from lots of directions. Just curious about your expectations that you think you can continue to maintain this ROA north of 1% with all the headwinds out there.

  • Ty Abston - Chairman & CEO

  • So Matt, I know I think we would go below 1%, but that being said, there's a lot of unknowns. And so depending on reserves, we feel prudent that we need to put into our reserve account during the year. We'll obviously be looking expenses very closely. And we're going to manage those aggressively. And the rest of it is just the market side of -- from mortgage to SBA, different income departments.

  • There's just not a lot of opportunity out there right now. So I don't see us dropping below 1% because we're going to be pulling on levers to avoid that. But I can't say it wouldn't happen either. Again, it's not the lack of clarity that we obviously had during COVID, but there is a lot of unknowns out there with everything going on until we see where the Fed is going to land with rates and kind of how that -- how hard or soft that landing is.

  • We're just being pretty cautious in how we think about things going forward. I will say during COVID, we set aside $13 million in reserves, and we didn't actually have any losses. So the fact that we set up reserves aside in '23 are just part of -- that's part of the CECL modelling and I could see us setting aside more reserves if we see further deterioration in the economy, whether that turns into actual credit loss or not will be our primary focus to see that doesn't. But that's a long way of saying. I really don't know the answer to that question. But certainly that would be a goal that we'll try to defend would be 1% ROA.

  • Matt Olney - Analyst

  • Yes. Thanks for that commentary, Ty. And kind of just following up on that around CECL and the allowance. You mentioned in 2020, kind of the big, the big build there. I think you got the ACL ratio up to that 180% level in 2020. I know CECL is always evolving, but just curious, do you think that still is -- is the 180 number still from the realm of possibility here this year? Or do you think you've -- the model has evolved over the last few years, which would make that less likely?

  • Ty Abston - Chairman & CEO

  • I think it's less likely. I think the worldwide pandemic was a black swan event that deserved a lot of real conservative assumptions with where things were going. I think this is as dire as that. That being said, again, we're looking at a lot of unknowns from the economic standpoint. We keep coming back to the fact that we're proud. I'm glad we're in Texas because the Texas economy overall is strong. So I'm hopeful that on the other side of this, we fare better than most parts of the country.

  • But there's just a lot of things, a lot of uncertainty out there. That creates some uncertainty on our part, but I don't think it's near as dire as something that we were dealing with in 2020 with -- which was COVID. But we're just -- we're being cautious with how we look at it because there's a lot of unknowns. And again, the velocity of these rate increases and how the Fed's pulled liquidity of the system with such scale, that's somewhat unprecedented, and that's the part that makes me a little cautious.

  • Matt Olney - Analyst

  • Understood. Okay. Thanks, guys. Appreciate your help.

  • Ty Abston - Chairman & CEO

  • Thanks, Matt.

  • Cappy Payne - Senior EVP and CFO

  • Absolutely, Matt.

  • Nona Branch - Executive Administrative Officer

  • Thank you for your questions. And I would like to remind everyone that a recording of this call will be available by 1 PM today on our Investor Relations page at gnty.com. Thank you for attending, and this concludes our call.