Live Oak Bancshares Inc (LOB) 2025 Q3 法說會逐字稿

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Live Oak Bancshares third-quarter 2025 earnings conference call. (Operator Instructions) I would now like to turn the conference call over to Greg Seward, General Counsel and Chief Risk Officer. Please go ahead.

女士們、先生們，早安，歡迎參加 Live Oak Bancshares 2025 年第三季財報電話會議。（操作員指示）現在我將把電話會議交給總法律顧問兼首席風險官格雷格·西沃德。請繼續。

Thank you. Good morning, everyone. Welcome to Live Oak's third quarter 2025 earnings conference call. We are webcasting live over the Internet, and this call is being recorded. To access the call over the Internet and review the presentation materials that we will reference on the call, please visit our website at investor.liveoakbank.com and go to the Events and Presentations tab for supporting materials.

謝謝。各位早安。歡迎參加 Live Oak 2025 年第三季財報電話會議。我們正在透過網路進行現場直播，並且本次通話將被錄音。如需透過網路收聽電話會議並查看我們將在電話會議上提及的簡報資料，請造訪我們的網站 investor.liveoakbank.com，然後前往「活動和簡報」標籤以取得支援資料。

Our earnings release is also available on our website. Before we get started, I would like to caution you that we may make forward-looking statements during today's call that are subject to risks and uncertainties. Factors that may cause actual results to differ materially from our expectations are detailed in the materials accompanying this call and in our SEC filings.

我們的盈利報告也可在我們的網站上查看。在正式開始之前，我想提醒各位，我們今天在電話會議中可能會發表一些前瞻性聲明，這些聲明存在風險和不確定性。可能導致實際結果與預期結果有重大差異的因素已在本次電話會議的附件和我們提交給美國證券交易委員會的文件中詳細說明。

We do not undertake to update the forward-looking statements to reflect the impact of circumstances or events that may arise after the date of today's call. Information about any non-GAAP financial measures referenced, including reconciliation of those measures to GAAP measures, can also be found in our SEC filings and in the presentation materials.

我們不承諾更新前瞻性聲明以反映今天電話會議日期之後可能出現的情況或事件的影響。有關文中提及的任何非GAAP財務指標的信息，包括這些指標與GAAP指標的調節表，也可以在我們的SEC文件和演示材料中找到。

I will now turn the call over to Chip Mahan, our Chairman and Chief Executive Officer.

現在我將把電話交給我們的董事長兼執行長奇普·馬漢。

Good morning, all, and BJ is going to kick us off.

各位早安，接下來由BJ來給大家開場。

Good morning, everybody. Let's get started with a big shout out to all of Live Oakers and our customers on slide 4. We're proud to be recognized as the number one SBA 7(a) lender for 2025 and by an impressive margin. Not only did we provide over $2.8 billion of loans to small businesses, but we also increased our production by 44% over last year, and our market share increased from 6.4% to 7.7%, and yet we still have plenty of room to grow in the program. Turning to slide 5.

各位早安。首先，讓我們向所有 Live Oakers 和我們的客戶致以熱烈的感謝（請參閱第 4 頁）。我們很榮幸被評為 2025 年排名第一的 SBA 7(a) 貸款機構，且領先優勢非常顯著。我們不僅向小型企業提供了超過 28 億美元的貸款，而且與去年相比，我們的產量也增長了 44%，市場份額從 6.4% 增長到 7.7%，但我們在這個項目中仍然有很大的發展空間。翻到第5張投影片。

We know what we are good at, and we're keeping the main thing, the main thing by ensuring our existing vertical lending and deposit gathering activities are our number one priority. This performance is top of the class from a growth perspective. Loan production up 22%, loan outstandings growth up 17%, customer deposit growth up 20% and PPNR up 24%.

我們知道自己擅長什麼，我們始終把最重要的事放在首位，確保我們現有的垂直貸款和存款業務成為我們的首要任務。從成長角度來看，這場比賽的表現堪稱一流。貸款發放量成長 22%，貸款餘額成長 17%，客戶存款成長 20%，PPNR 成長 24%。

These results reflect the hard work all our teams have done to create outcomes that are more consistent and sustainable over time. That's our goal. To ensure our profitable growth trajectory continues over the medium term, we are extending our customer product offerings by adding checking and small dollar SBA loan capabilities. Both of these efforts launched in early 2024. And in a little over 18 months, our teams have made significant gains in winning customer checking relationships and serving more small business borrowers.

這些成果體現了我們所有團隊為創造更穩定、更永續的長期成果所付出的辛勤努力。這就是我們的目標。為了確保我們在中期內繼續保持獲利成長勢頭，我們正在透過增加支票帳戶和小額 SBA 貸款功能來擴展我們的客戶產品。這兩項措施均於 2024 年初啟動。在短短 18 個月多一點的時間裡，我們的團隊在贏得客戶信任和為更多小型企業借款人提供服務方面取得了顯著進展。

On the checking front, we ended the quarter with $363 million of checking balances or 4% of our total deposit base, up from only 2% this time last year. This increase is even more impressive when you consider that our total deposit base grew 17% year-over-year.

在支票帳戶方面，本季末我們的支票帳戶餘額為 3.63 億美元，佔總存款額的 4%，高於去年同期的 2%。考慮到我們的存款總額年增了 17%，這一增長就更加令人印象深刻了。

We have about one-third of our new loan customers opening a checking account with us each quarter, and we expect that percentage to increase as we add more capabilities such as merchant services. At the beginning of 2024, only roughly 6% of our customers had both a loan and deposit relationship with us. Today, that percentage is 20%.

每個季度，我們約有三分之一的新貸款客戶在我們這裡開設支票帳戶，我們預計隨著我們增加更多功能（例如商家服務），這一比例還會增加。2024年初，只有大約6%的客戶同時與我們建立了貸款和存款關係。如今，這個比例是20%。

All this is leading to deeper relationships with customers, better insight into customer cash flows and meaningful reductions in the cost of deposits, both now and over time. On the small dollar 7(a) front, what we call Live Oak Express, production is ramping up meaningfully and will continue to do so.

所有這些都將帶來與客戶更深入的關係，以更好地了解客戶的現金流，並顯著降低存款成本，無論現在還是將來。在小額 7(a) 級大麻方面，我們稱之為 Live Oak Express，其產量正在顯著增加，並將繼續增加。

These loans are also very desirable on the secondary market and are leading to a nice gain on sale increase. We are continuing our efforts to make it simpler, easier, faster and more efficient for our people to serve our customers.

這些貸款在二級市場上也很受歡迎，並且能夠帶來可觀的出售收益成長。我們將繼續努力，使我們的員工能夠更簡單、更輕鬆、更快捷、更有效率地為客戶服務。

And in Live Oak Express, we will be piloting an AI-enabled loan origination solution to do just that, which will significantly improve our speed to close for the borrower and the efficiency of our process from the lender all the way through to servicing and loan operations.

在 Live Oak Express 中，我們將試行人工智慧輔助的貸款發起解決方案，以實現這一目標，這將顯著提高我們為借款人完成貸款的速度，並提高從貸款機構到服務和貸款營運的整個流程的效率。

The tangible result of our efforts is showcased on slide 6. As you can see, the true earnings power of the company is strong in PPNR, revenue and pretax income on both a quarter-over-quarter and year-over-year basis. We continue to be very focused on building more consistent and sustainable profitability. Healthy revenue growth continues and with appropriate supportive expense growth, operating leverage is strong.

我們努力的實際成果在第 6 張投影片中展示。從您所看到的，該公司真正的盈利能力在 PPNR、收入和稅前利潤方面都很強勁，無論是環比增長還是同比增長。我們將繼續專注於建立更穩定、更永續的獲利能力。營收持續健康成長，加上適當的支出成長，經營槓桿作用強勁。

With credit impacts moderating in line with our expectations, a significant improvement is evident in our pretax income results. In short, our momentum continues with more to come. So with that, Walt, how about running through some of the financial highlights.

隨著信貸影響按照我們的預期有所緩和，我們的稅前收入表現明顯改善。總之，我們的發展動能依然強勁，未來還會有更多精彩表現。那麼，沃爾特，我們來回顧一些重要的財務數據。

Thanks, BJ. Good morning, everyone. Diving into the quarter on page 8. Our Q3 earnings per share of $0.55 increased 8% linked quarter and almost doubled compared to Q3 of 2024. This outstanding growth was aided by the 7% linked quarter and 24% versus prior year increase in core operating leverage that BJ just highlighted as well as a lower quarterly provision expense.

謝謝你，BJ。各位早安。深入探討第 8 頁的內容。我們第三季每股收益為 0.55 美元，季增 8%，與 2024 年第三季相比幾乎翻了一番。這一卓越成長得益於 BJ 剛才強調的核心營運槓桿環比增長 7% 和同比增長 24%，以及季度撥備支出減少。

The 7% quarter-over-quarter improvement in core operating leverage was driven by a 6% quarter-over-quarter increase in net interest income, aided by $551 million or 5% linked quarter in loan balance growth and 5 basis points of margin expansion to 3.33%. On the growth front, our small business and commercial banking lenders as well as our loan support teams continue to generate high-caliber loans while replenishing their pipelines.

核心經營槓桿環比改善 7%，主要得益於淨利息收入環比增長 6%，貸款餘額環比增長 5.51 億美元（5%），利潤率環比擴大 5 個基點至 3.33%。在成長方面，我們的小型企業和商業銀行貸款人員以及貸款支援團隊繼續發放高品質的貸款，同時不斷補充他們的貸款管道。

Our deposits business continues to fund the bank in an extremely competitive market. As BJ mentioned, we continue to be encouraged by the momentum in our two focused initiatives of growing noninterest-bearing business checking balances and originating small dollar SBA 7(a) loans via our Live Oak Express product. Quarterly provision expense was $22 million and was lower for the fourth consecutive quarter.

在競爭異常激烈的市場中，我們的存款業務持續為銀行提供資金。正如 BJ 所提到的，我們繼續受到鼓舞，因為我們的兩項重點舉措——增加無息企業支票帳戶餘額和透過我們的 Live Oak Express 產品發放小額 SBA 7(a) 貸款——都取得了良好的進展。本季撥備支出為 2,200 萬美元，連續第四季度下降。

Our reserve and resulting quarterly provision expense continue to be driven by strong loan growth and our navigation of the small business credit cycle that we have discussed over the past few quarters.

我們的儲備金和由此產生的季度撥備支出繼續受到強勁貸款增長以及我們對過去幾個季度以來一直在討論的小型企業信貸週期的應對的影響。

Lastly, on the capital front, we successfully raised $100 million with our inaugural preferred offering, generating quality Tier 1 growth capital to support our growth aspirations. Next quarter, we will have another earnings and capital accretive event with Apiture agree to sale, which will result in a $24 million onetime gain while also removing approximately $6 million of annual pass-through losses from our income statement.

最後，在資金方面，我們透過首次優先股發行成功籌集了 1 億美元，產生了優質的一級成長資本，以支持我們的成長目標。下個季度，我們將迎來另一項收益和資本增值事件，即 Apiture 同意出售，這將帶來 2,400 萬美元的一次性收益，同時還將從我們的損益表中消除約 600 萬美元的年度轉嫁損失。

Page 9 provides a financial snapshot of our Q3 earnings results on the top left with quarter-over-quarter demonstrated improvement across all major profitability and growth metrics highlighted on the bottom left. I'd like to briefly highlight two other items on this page. The first being the bottom right corner of this slide, where we capture notable noncore items each quarter as they arise.

第 9 頁左上角提供了我們第三季度收益的財務概覽，左下角突出顯示了所有主要盈利能力和增長指標的季度環比改善情況。我想簡要地重點介紹一下本頁上的另外兩項內容。第一個是本投影片的右下角，我們在這裡記錄每個季度出現的重要的非核心項目。

Specifically, in Q3 of 2025, these items collectively had an estimated negative impact of approximately $1.5 million on our reported earnings. The second item is the tax expense line. Similar to last year, we had seasonal increase in the third quarter effective tax rate that was driven by compensation-related accounting treatment in the tax calculation. Slide 10 highlights our loan originations by vertical and business units. A few things to note here.

具體而言，在 2025 年第三季度，這些項目合計預計將對我們報告的收益產生約 150 萬美元的負面影響。第二項是稅費支出。與去年類似，第三季實際稅率出現了季節性成長，這是由於稅務計算中與薪資相關的會計處理所致。第 10 張投影片重點介紹了我們按垂直產業和業務部門劃分的貸款發放。這裡有幾點要注意。

As shown on the right-hand side of the page, our Q3 2025 loan originations totaled approximately $1.65 billion, an 8% increase linked quarter, driven primarily by our Commercial Banking segment. Production momentum in 2025 remains strong across our spectrum of verticals with approximately two-third of our verticals originating more production year-to-date in 2025 than they did in year-to-date 2024.

如頁面右側所示，我們 2025 年第三季的貸款發放總額約為 16.5 億美元，比上一季成長 8%，主要由我們的商業銀行部門推動。2025 年，我們各個垂直領域的生產動能依然強勁，其中約三分之二的垂直領域在 2025 年的年初至今產量超過了 2024 年的年初至今產量。

Lastly, the bottom right of the page highlights the linked quarter-over-quarter and year-over-year loan portfolio growth trends by lending segment, with both segments providing double-digit year-over-year growth rates. Slide 11 illustrates quarter-over-quarter loan and deposit balance growth, highlighting the strong consistent growth trends on both fronts.

最後，頁面右下角突出顯示了按貸款細分市場劃分的季度環比和年度同比貸款組合成長趨勢，這兩個細分市場均實現了兩位數的同比增長率。第 11 張投影片展示了季度環比貸款和存款餘額成長情況，突顯了這兩個方面強勁且持續的成長趨勢。

Our total loan portfolio grew approximately 5% linked quarter with year-over-year loan balances increasing approximately 17%, outstanding durable growth that you don't often see across the current industry landscape. The approximately 3% linked quarter increase in customer deposits was consistent with Q2 2024's customer deposit growth rate, while our year-over-year customer deposit growth rate was an outstanding 20%.

我們的總貸款組合環比增長約 5%，年比貸款餘額增長約 17%，這是在當前行業環境中不常見的卓越且持久的增長。客戶存款較上季成長約 3%，與 2024 年第二季的客戶存款成長率一致，而我們的年比客戶存款成長率高達 20%。

As you can see in the second half of 2024's growth rates on the bottom of the page, we typically experience a slower seasonal growth rate in the second half of the year on the customer deposit front and expect the second half of 2025 to be no different.

從頁面底部的 2024 年下半年成長率可以看出，我們通常在下半年的客戶存款成長率會放緩，預計 2025 年下半年也不會例外。

Year-to-date growth in customer deposits has primarily been driven by our consumer and business savings products as we remain competitively priced in the market to support our aforementioned loan growth and via our business checking growth, which we highlight on our growth trends on page 12. We saw a nice ramp in business checking in Q3 of 2025, with checking balances increasing 26% linked quarter to $363 million.

今年迄今為止，客戶存款的成長主要得益於我們的消費者和企業儲蓄產品，因為我們在市場上保持了具有競爭力的價格，以支持我們前面提到的貸款成長，並透過我們的企業支票帳戶成長，我們在第 12 頁的成長趨勢中重點介紹了這一點。2025 年第三季度，我們看到企業支票帳戶出現了不錯的成長，支票帳戶餘額較上季成長 26%，達到 3.63 億美元。

Our total low-cost deposits, including noninterest-bearing checking balances as well as low-cost collateral construction and loan reserve accounts, now totals approximately 4% of our total deposit basis, a 2% -- or 2x increase year-over-year. As BJ highlighted, adding noninterest-bearing deposits to our primarily competitively market priced customer deposits and wholesale deposit portfolio is substantially accretive to our earnings profile.

我們的低成本存款總額（包括不計息的支票存款餘額以及低成本的抵押品建設和貸款儲備帳戶）目前約占我們存款總額的 4%，比去年同期增長了 2%，即翻了一番。正如 BJ 所強調的，在我們主要以具有市場競爭力的價格出售的客戶存款和批發存款組合中增加無息存款，將大大提高我們的盈利能力。

These deposits not only enhance our margin efficiency, but also strengthen the overall resilience of our funding mix with deeper customer relationships. As such, they remain a key strategic priority for us as we head into 2026 and beyond. Net interest income and margin trends are highlighted on slide 13.

這些存款不僅提高了我們的利潤率，而且透過加深與客戶的關係，增強了我們整體融資結構的韌性。因此，在邁向 2026 年及以後，它們仍然是我們的關鍵策略重點。第 13 頁重點介紹了淨利息收入和利潤率趨勢。

In Q2 of 2025 -- sorry, Q3 of 2025, we saw our quarterly net interest income increased $6 million or 6% linked quarter and $23 million or 19% compared to Q3 of 2024. Our net interest margin also expanded another 5 basis points to 3.33%, our third consecutive quarter of margin expansion, aided both by growth as well as continued deposit repricing as highlighted on the bottom of the table in the middle of the page.

2025 年第二季（抱歉，應該是 2025 年第三季），我們的季度淨利息收入季增 600 萬美元，增幅為 6%；與 2024 年第三季相比，成長 2,300 萬美元，增幅為 19%。我們的淨利差也進一步擴大了 5 個基點，達到 3.33%，這是我們連續第三個季度實現息差擴大，這既得益於增長，也得益於存款持續重新定價，如頁面中間表格底部所示。

As the Fed cut in September, and we expect more cuts to come in the very near future, perhaps as early as next week, here is a general reminder of how this impacts our net interest income and margin trajectory. The first is we have an asset-sensitive balance sheet with approximately two-third of our loans being variable and tied to either SOFR or prime.

由於聯準會在 9 月降息，我們預計在不久的將來還會有更多降息，可能最早下週就會降息，以下是降息對我們的淨利息收入和利潤率軌蹟的一般性提醒。首先，我們的資產負債表對資產較為敏感，約三分之二的貸款為浮動利率，與 SOFR 或基準利率掛鉤。

The second is our funding base is predominantly in liquid savings accounts, short-term customer CDs and broker deposits. Since the Fed began easing last December, our blended savings cumulative downward beta is approximately 44%. This is largely a result of us not pricing to the top of the market while the Fed was tightening.

第二點是，我們的資金基礎主要來自流動性儲蓄帳戶、短期客戶定期存款和經紀商存款。自聯準會去年 12 月開始放鬆貨幣政策以來，我們的混合儲蓄累計下降貝塔係數約為 44%。這主要是由於聯準會收緊貨幣政策時，我們沒有將價格定價到市場頂部所致。

And as such, we have blended the top of the market reprice down towards us through 2025. Ultimately, we monitor both deposit market and funding levels closely, ensuring that we continue to support our loan growth appropriately while also adjusting pricing to support margin aspirations and profitability.

因此，我們已經將市場頂部重新定價的趨勢向下推移至 2025 年。最終，我們將密切關注存款市場和資金水平，確保我們繼續適當地支持貸款成長，同時調整定價以支持利潤率目標和獲利能力。

Our current outlook is that the Fed cuts 25 basis points in October and December of 2025, followed by three additional 25 basis point cuts in March, June and September of 2026. Yet Fed forecasts vary and as such, we so do net interest income and margin outlooks.

我們目前的預測是，聯準會將在 2025 年 10 月和 12 月降息 25 個基點，然後在 2026 年 3 月、6 月和 9 月再降息三次，每次 25 個基點。然而，聯準會的預測各不相同，因此，我們對淨利息收入和利潤率的預期也各不相同。

We evaluate a gauntlet of forward-looking scenarios to assess the potential tone of net interest income and margin outcomes. And generally speaking, larger or more frequent Fed cuts provide more margin compression in the near term, while flat interest rates less cuts and less frequent cuts provide more margin opportunity.

我們評估了一系列前瞻性情景，以評估淨利息收入和利潤率結果的潛在方向。總的來說，聯準會更大幅度或更頻繁的降息會在短期內造成更大的利潤空間壓縮，而利率保持不變、降息幅度較小或降息頻率較低則會提供更大的利潤空間。

Ultimately, assuming that the deposit market is rational and reprices appropriately, our margin typically recovers relatively quickly due to the short-term nature of our funding base. Ultimately, what really matters, however, is not simply the margin but the net interest income generated.

最終，假設存款市場是理性的，並且重新定價適當，由於我們的資金基礎是短期的，我們的利潤通常會相對迅速地恢復。然而，歸根究底，真正重要的不僅是利潤率，而是產生的淨利息收入。

And our net interest income performance is more resilient due to our strong growth. To drive this point home, over the last six years, 24 out of 26 quarters experienced stable or growth in net interest income despite our net interest margin peaking at 4% and valuing at 2.56% over the same time frame.

由於我們強勁的成長，我們的淨利息收入表現更具韌性。為了強調這一點，在過去的六年裡，儘管我們的淨利差最高達到 4%，淨利差最高達到 2.56%，但在 26 個季度中有 24 個季度淨利息收入保持穩定或增長。

Moving to guaranteed loan sale trends on slide 14. The secondary market continues to provide consistent earnings while acting as a good source of recycled liquidity. We added some depth to this page this quarter to provide insight to our gain on sale composition and to highlight the accretive contribution we are already realizing from our small loan SBA origination efforts. Our quarterly gain on sale remains primarily driven by our typical larger SBA loan sales, which have provided a consistent $13 million to $15 million a quarter of gain on sale at an average premium in the 106 to 107 range.

第 14 頁將討論擔保貸款銷售趨勢。二級市場持續提供穩定的收益，同時也是良好的循環流動性來源。本季度我們對本頁進行了一些深入分析，以提供有關我們出售收益構成方面的見解，並重點介紹我們已經從小額貸款 SBA 發放工作中獲得的增值貢獻。我們的季度銷售收益仍然主要來自我們通常較大的 SBA 貸款銷售，每季持續帶來 1,300 萬至 1,500 萬美元的銷售收益，平均溢價在 106 至 107 之間。

We've now had two consecutive quarters of USDA loan sales, which is encouraging, yet ultimately, the timing and execution of these sales is driven by the completion of the underlying projects, rate environment and investor demand.

我們已經連續兩個季度實現了美國農業部貸款銷售，這令人鼓舞，但歸根結底，這些銷售的時機和執行取決於基礎項目的完成情況、利率環境和投資者需求。

Similar to my comments on growing checking balances, our focus on ramping our Live Oak Express origination is providing immediate results with our small loan SBA sales providing for $12 million in year-to-date gain on sale, approximately 4x or $9 million more compared to year-to-date 2024, while also providing for approximately 20% of our year-to-date total gain on sale compared to only 8% in year-to-date 2024.

與我之前關於增加支票帳戶餘額的評論類似，我們專注於擴大 Live Oak Express 的貸款發放規模，這帶來了即時的效果。我們的小額貸款 SBA 銷售額今年迄今的銷售收益為 1,200 萬美元，比 2024 年同期成長了約 4 倍，即 900 萬美元，同時也占我們今年迄今總銷售收益的約 20%，而 2024 年同期僅為 8%。

To help ramp this product going forward, we remain focused on both filling the top of the funnel through partnerships and lender referrals while also leveraging AI to make the origination and servicing more efficient for our people and our customers. Expense trends are detailed on slide 15.

為了幫助該產品未來發展壯大，我們將繼續專注於透過合作夥伴關係和貸款機構推薦來充實潛在客戶，同時利用人工智慧來提高我們員工和客戶的貸款發起和服務效率。支出趨勢詳見第15頁。

Q3 reported noninterest expense of $87 million decreased approximately $2 million or approximately 2% linked quarter. We remain focused on supporting our growth via good costs while also working to improve efficiency. This renewed focus on growing revenues faster than expenses and improving operating leverage really began back in the third quarter of 2023.

第三季報告的非利息支出為 8,700 萬美元，比上一季減少了約 200 萬美元，降幅約為 2%。我們將繼續專注於透過控製成本來支援業務成長，同時努力提高效率。這種重新聚焦於實現收入成長速度超過支出成長速度以及提高營運槓桿的策略，實際上始於 2023 年第三季。

You can see the results of that focus on the right-hand side of this page with loan production, core operating leverage and revenue growth, all significantly outweighing our expense growth as compared to the third quarter of -- comparing the third quarter of 2025 to the third quarter of 2023.

您可以在本頁右側看到這種專注所帶來的成果，貸款產量、核心營運槓桿和收入成長均顯著超過了我們的支出成長，與 2025 年第三季相比，2023 年第三季的情況有所不同。

We are keenly focused on improving both our customer and employee experiences, embracing the automation and AI wave across our entire business and enhancing our current technology stack, all with the resulting goal of creating internal and external raving fans, improving efficiency and providing for a solid mature foundation that will support our growth.

我們致力於改善客戶和員工體驗，在整個業務中擁抱自動化和人工智慧浪潮，並增強我們當前的技術堆疊，所有這些最終目標都是創造內部和外部的忠實擁躉，提高效率，並為我們的成長提供堅實成熟的基礎。

Turning to credit. Slide 16 provides insight into the portfolio with a view of key credit ratio trends in the table at the top with visualization of over 30-day past dues, nonaccruals and provision trends on the bottom. Our over 30-day past dues remained low for the fourth consecutive quarter with $16 million or 14 basis points of our held-for-investment loan portfolio past due as of September 30. The amount of nonaccrual loans increased to $85 million or 73 basis points of our unguaranteed held for investment loan portfolio in Q3.

轉向信貸。第 16 張投影片提供了對投資組合的深入了解，頂部表格顯示了關鍵信貸比率趨勢，底部則以視覺化方式展示了超過 30 天的逾期款項、非應計款項和撥備趨勢。截至 9 月 30 日，我們持有的投資貸款組合中逾期 30 天以上的貸款連續第四個季度保持較低水平，逾期金額為 1600 萬美元，即 14 個基點。第三季度，非應計貸款金額增加至 8,500 萬美元，占我們無擔保投資貸款組合的 73 個基點。

Nonaccrual balances remain very manageable as our servicing team continues to support SBA customers impacted by the small business credit cycle. Provision expense of $22 million improved in Q3 and was influenced by strong $551 million quarter-over-quarter loan growth, what we often refer to as good provision and portfolio performance.

由於我們的服務團隊繼續為受小型企業信貸週期影響的 SBA 客戶提供支持，因此非應計餘額仍然非常容易管理。第三季撥備支出為 2,200 萬美元，有所改善，這得益於強勁的季度環比貸款增長 5.51 億美元，我們通常稱之為良好的撥備和投資組合表現。

While quarter-over-quarter provision will fluctuate based on growth and portfolio activity, we remain comfortable with our reserves. Last page for me on capital -- our capital strength was bolstered in Q3 of 2025 with our preferred issuance as shown on page 17. The $100 million issuance added approximately 90 basis points of total risk-based capital and approximately 70 basis points of Tier 1 leverage, excellent Tier 1 growth capital.

儘管季度撥備會根據成長和投資組合活動而波動，但我們對我們的儲備仍然感到滿意。關於資本的最後一頁——如第 17 頁所示，我們在 2025 年第三季透過優先股發行增強了資本實力。此次發行1億美元債券，增加了約90個基點的總創投和約70個基點的1級槓桿，以及優秀的1級成長資本。

Our equity method investment in Apiture will provide for an additional capital accretive event in Q4 with Apiture's recent sale closing in October. In addition, the removal of approximately $6 million of pass-through losses going forward will largely help fund the annual preferred dividends on the preferred issuance. Thank you again for joining this morning. And with that, I'll turn it back over to BJ for his closing comments before we head to Q&A.

我們採用權益法對 Apiture 的投資將在第四季度帶來額外的資本增值事件，Apiture 最近的出售已於 10 月完成。此外，未來約 600 萬美元的轉嫁損失的消除將極大地幫助支付優先股發行的年度優先股股息。再次感謝您今天早上的參與。接下來，我將把發言權交還給 BJ，請他作總結發言，之後我們將進入問答環節。

Great. Thanks, Walt. Momentum is building. We're focused on the biggest and best opportunities, and we're modernizing our activities to take full advantage of the AI-driven possibilities that are right in front of us. So with a big thank you to all Live Oakers and our customers, let's take some questions.

偉大的。謝謝你，沃特。勢頭正在增強。我們專注於最大、最好的機遇，並正在對我們的業務進行現代化改造，以充分利用擺在我們面前的人工智慧驅動的各種可能性。在此，我要衷心感謝所有 Live Oakers 和我們的客戶，接下來讓我們回答一些問題。

Dave Rochester, Cantor.

戴夫·羅徹斯特，領唱。

Can you just -- just to start with credit. Can you give a little more color around the increase in the NPAs this quarter and talk about the new default trends as well? And then just on charge-offs, I would imagine you're expecting those to decline, but if there's any reason why those remain elevated, I would love to hear.

你能先——就從信用開始嗎？您能否更詳細地介紹本季不良貸款增加的情況，並談談新的違約趨勢？至於壞帳核銷，我想您應該預期這些數字會下降，但如果有什麼原因導致這些數字仍然居高不下，我很想知道。

Yes. This is Mike Cairns, Chief Credit Officer. Happy to take that. So I look at this quarter as just a continuation of where we were last quarter. Fortunately, not all credit metrics always move in a perfectly linear way.

是的。這是首席信貸官麥克·凱恩斯。樂意接受。所以我認為本季只是上季的延續。幸運的是，並非所有信用指標都總是以完全線性的方式變化。

So we saw some nonaccrual balances tick up a little bit, but still a very manageable balance there and not -- this all kind of came from our SBA portfolio. Nothing caught us by surprise. These are loans that we've been tracking and are related to similar the stress that the small business owners have faced over the last few quarters, which we've talked about quite a bit. So I think about nonaccruals as far as balances, not all nonaccruals are created equally.

所以我們看到一些非應計餘額略有上升，但餘額仍然非常可控，而且——這一切都來自我們的 SBA 貸款組合。一切都在意料之中。這些貸款是我們一直在追蹤的，它們與小企業主在過去幾季面臨的類似壓力有關，我們已經對此進行了許多討論。所以，就餘額而言，我認為非應計項目並非都具有相同的價值。

So when you look at default count, it's also up as well, but not in a dramatic way. The other things I look at are past dues. So with an SBA portfolio as large as ours, having 14 basis points worth of past dues is something I'm incredibly proud of and how our team has managed that. To me, that's an indication that our servicing team is on the portfolio and taking care of it. Reserve levels came down.

所以，當你查看預設值時，它也有所上升，但上升幅度並不大。我也會關注其他一些事項，例如逾期未付的款項。因此，對於我們這樣規模的 SBA 貸款組合來說，只有 14 個基點的逾期款項，我感到非常自豪，也為我們團隊能夠做到這一點而感到驕傲。在我看來，這表明我們的服務團隊正在關注並妥善處理該專案。儲備水準下降。

So not all nonaccruals turned into charge-offs to your question. And so while that has ticked down, we still have really healthy coverage on the portfolio. I feel good about where we are in reserves. And so there's a lot of economic uncertainty out there that has been discussed by other banks.

所以，回答你的問題，並非所有非應計項目都變成了沖銷。因此，儘管這一數字有所下降，但我們的投資組合仍然保持著非常健康的覆蓋率。我對我們目前的儲備狀況感到滿意。因此，目前存在著許多經濟不確定性，其他銀行也討論過這些問題。

And what we control is -- or what we focus on is what we can control, sound underwriting, which we continue to have. I talked about that last quarter, and we continue to focus on not stretching on credit quality, which we have not done and heavily servicing the portfolio.

而我們能夠控制的——或者說我們關注的是我們能夠控制的——是穩健的承保，而我們一直擁有這種能力。我上個季度談到了這一點，我們將繼續專注於不提高信貸品質（我們一直沒有這樣做），並大力維護投資組合。

So for example, we are now going through our annual risk rate process for the entire SBA portfolio, and we will have a servicing team member and a credit officer assessing the risk rate for every meaningful balance within that portfolio. And that's above and beyond our day-to-day servicing that we do, which is interacting with our customers, collecting financial information, spreading that, talking through that with our customers and doing site visits. So a lot of hands and eyes on the portfolio.

例如，我們現在正在對整個 SBA 投資組合進行年度風險率評估，我們將安排一名服務團隊成員和一名信貸員來評估該投資組合中每個有意義的餘額的風險率。這還不包括我們日常提供的服務，例如與客戶互動、收集財務資訊、傳播這些資訊、與客戶溝通以及進行現場訪問。所以很多人都在關注這個投資組合。

And I think as I sit here today, I think what we're finding is that while there has historically been a little bit of a cycle in the SBA industry, our small business owners have remained relatively resilient in the face of that.

而我今天坐在這裡，我認為我們發現，雖然小型企業管理局 (SBA) 行業歷來存在一些週期性波動，但我們的小企業主面對這種情況仍然保持了相對的韌性。

Appreciate that. And then how are you thinking about the potential for an extended government shutdown and what that can do for -- on both the loan side in terms of loan growth and then credit. And when do things start to potentially get rough? What are you guys worried about on this front?

謝謝。那麼，您如何看待政府長期停擺的可能性，以及這會對貸款方面（包括貸款成長和信貸）產生什麼影響？那麼，事情什麼時候開始可能會變得棘手呢？你們在這方面擔心什麼？

Hey, Dave, this is Walter Phifer, CFO. I'll start on the loan growth side and secondary market side and then Michael can jump in on credit. Unfortunately, government shutdowns is something we've had practice with over the years. So we have a pretty extensive playbook that we pull out when these things happen.

嘿，戴夫，我是財務長沃爾特‧菲弗。我將先從貸款成長和二級市場方面入手，然後邁克爾可以加入信貸方面的工作。不幸的是，政府停擺是我們多年來經歷過的常態。所以，當這種情況發生時，我們會拿出一套相當全面的應對方案。

And the first and pretty much kind of the initial action that we take any time there's a potential for a shutdown is we look at our pipeline, especially our SBA loans and start to pull PLPs to reserve that SBA funding.

每當出現停工的可能性時，我們採取的第一個也是最先採取的行動就是查看我們的專案儲備，特別是我們的 SBA 貸款，並開始撤回 PLP 以保留 SBA 資金。

Coming into this shutdown, we've -- our team really pushed in September. We had about $900 million of PLPs pulled so that we can continue to operate business as usual and get that capital out to the small businesses.

在這次停工之前，我們的團隊在9月真的加緊了工作。我們提取了約 9 億美元的 PLP，以便我們能夠繼續照常經營業務，並將這些資金發放給小型企業。

So from a growth standpoint, that feels really good. Now obviously, the longer the shutdown, you kind of get in through the end of the quarter. The PLPs there, a bunch of run out and then Michael and his team will assess bridge loans as appropriate.

所以從成長的角度來看，這感覺真的很好。很顯然，停工時間越長，就越有可能持續到季度末。那裡的 PLP 很多，跑出去之後，Michael 和他的團隊將酌情評估過渡貸款。

The other big impact for us is on the secondary markets. Now we typically don't sell any of our loans in the first 30 to 45 days of any given quarter. So right now, we haven't seen an impact at all of the current shutdown. Once the shutdown ends, we -- the secondary market opens up pretty quickly and we get our loan sales out, we settle. I'd say right now, the shutdown extended past Thanksgiving.

對我們來說，另一個重大影響體現在二級市場。通常情況下，我們不會在任何季度的前 30 到 45 天內出售任何貸款。所以目前為止，我們還沒有看到這次停工造成任何影響。一旦停擺結束，二級市場就會很快開放，我們的貸款銷售就會完成，我們會進行結算。我認為，目前的停擺時間已經持續到感恩節之後了。

That may impact us here in the near term in the Q4 in terms of secondary market sale execution. But once the market opens, we get back out there and we'd catch up later in the quarter or going into Q1 of next year.

這可能會在第四季度對我們二級市場銷售執行產生影響。但一旦市場開放，我們就會重新投入運營，並在本季晚些時候或明年第一季趕上進度。

Appreciate all the color there. Maybe just one last one, if I could. Just switching gears to the AI enhancements you've been talking about in terms of processing times and whatnot. Can you just quantify what those benefits could be? And then it sounds like you guys just overall look very favorably at what AI can do to the expense base and how you can potentially keep that more stable. If you could just talk about that a little bit, that would be great.

欣賞那裡繽紛的色彩。如果可以的話，也許就再來一次吧。我們現在來談談你剛才提到的AI增強功能，例如處理時間等面向。能具體量化一下這些好處是什麼嗎？聽起來你們總體上對人工智慧在降低成本結構方面所能發揮的作用以及如何使其更加穩定持非常積極的態度。如果你能稍微談談這方面的話，那就太好了。

Sure. The history of Live Oak and the gentleman sitting next to me is one of innovation and looking at what's coming down the pike in terms of technology, technology enhancements and the art of the possible. And AI, we think, could be bigger than any of the meaningful step changes in technological advancement from the Internet to cloud computing. They were big. We think AI is even bigger.

當然。Live Oak 的歷史，以及坐在我旁邊的這位先生的歷史，都是關於創新，以及展望未來科技發展、科技進步和探索各種可能性的歷史。我們認為，人工智慧的影響可能比從互聯網到雲端運算等任何有意義的技術進步都更大。它們個頭很大。我們認為人工智慧的影響更大。

And so what we're doing is we're spending a significant amount of time educating our people on all the tools available. So developers are all using cursor and understanding how to code in AI.

因此，我們正在投入大量時間，為我們的員工普及所有可用的工具。所以開發人員都在使用遊標，並且了解如何在人工智慧領域進行編碼。

But the rest of our organization is learning to use prompts and build agents for specific processes. And we have people in our insurance group that are literally building their own agents to automate a lot of the follow-up that we have to do with insurance companies to ensure that our borrowers have the appropriate insurance.

但我們組織的其他成員正在學習如何使用提示並為特定流程建立代理。我們保險集團內部有人正在建立自己的代理系統，以實現與保險公司後續跟進工作的自動化，從而確保我們的借款人獲得合適的保險。

And that's being done at an individual level, not just an institutional level. And then Renato Derraik and his technology team are way out in front of what a lot of others are doing, and we're building significant Agentic AI solutions, both in-house and with partners to drive across the company.

而這種做法是在個人層面上進行的，而不僅僅是在機構層面。此外，Renato Derraik 和他的技術團隊遠遠領先於許多其他人，我們正在建立重要的智慧體人工智慧解決方案，包括內部解決方案和與合作夥伴共同開發的解決方案，以推動整個公司的發展。

And I think a unique opportunity that we have at Live Oak is that we are growing so fast. I think there's a lot of both excitement and trepidation about what AI might do and how that impacts the employee base and what that means for them.

我認為 Live Oak 擁有的獨特機會在於我們發展速度非常快。我認為大家對人工智慧可能帶來的影響，以及它將如何影響員工群體和對他們意味著什麼，既感到興奮又感到擔憂。

And I think because we have so much growth opportunity over the next several years that what that will mean is AI will help the productivity of our people over time and maybe we have to grow our employee base and our expense base a lot less to generate the same level of revenue as opposed to maybe some others, particularly in our industry that aren't seeing nearly as much top line growth and have to use AI to reduce cost.

我認為，由於未來幾年我們擁有如此多的成長機會，這意味著人工智慧將隨著時間的推移提高我們員工的生產力，我們或許需要大幅減少員工人數和支出規模，才能產生與業內其他一些公司相同的收入水平，而這些公司，尤其是我們這個行業中那些收入增長遠不如我們強勁，不得不利用人工智能來降低成本的公司，則無需如此。

And so I think our operating leverage because of our use of AI could exponentially grow our profitability while also making our -- make it easier for our people to do business, have more capacity to serve customers and make the customer experience far better. So the world of opportunity is endless out there, and we're already working on capturing a lot of it.

因此，我認為，由於我們使用人工智慧，我們的營運槓桿可以倍增我們的獲利能力，同時也能讓我們的員工更容易開展業務，擁有更大的能力服務客戶，並大大改善客戶體驗。所以，外面的世界充滿無限機遇，我們已經在努力抓住其中的許多機會。

I know I've talked a long time, but very excited about this. I did mention we're doing a lot of piloting, particularly around our loan origination platform, starting with our small dollar loans and looking at a platform that is completely AI-driven and incredibly, incredibly easy to use all the way from the lender back to servicing and operations. And so a little bit more to come on that, but that's just one example where we're already ahead and putting major things in practice that are going to help us over the long term.

我知道我講了很久，但我真的非常興奮。我之前提到過，我們正在進行大量的試點項目，尤其是在我們的貸款發起平台方面，從我們的小額貸款開始，並著眼於一個完全由人工智能驅動、從貸款方到服務和運營都極其易於使用的平台。關於這一點，我們稍後還會再談，但這只是一個例子，說明我們已經走在前列，並將一些重要的事情付諸實踐，這將在長期內幫助我們。

Sounds like that will be a pretty solid competitive advantage for you guys.

聽起來這會成為你們相當可靠的競爭優勢。

Thanks, Dave.

謝謝你，戴夫。

Tim Switzer, KBW.

提姆‧斯威策，KBW。

First question I have is on the trajectory for the margin. We're reentering the rate cut cycle. And I think you guys are long-term beneficiaries from rate cuts as long as assuming we get a steeper yield curve. But assuming we get one or two more in the back half of this year and maybe another one next year, how does that impact the near-term NIM? And then maybe what's the time line for when we start to see it rebound and inflect back higher?

我的第一個問題是關於利潤率的走勢。我們即將重新進入降息週期。我認為，只要殖利率曲線趨於陡峭，降息就會使你們長期受益。但假設今年下半年我們再迎來一到兩場疫情，明年可能還會再迎來一場，那麼這對近期的淨利差會產生怎樣的影響呢？那麼，我們大概需要多久才能看到它開始反彈並回升呢？

Hey, Tim, this is Walt. I'll jump in on that one. I think you got to leverage a lot of the comments I made kind of earlier. I think if you look at kind of the models you see out there, I think they were perfect coming into this before there's an October cut. Now there's an October cut, so you have to kind of flush that through.

嘿，提姆，我是沃特。我也想參與討論。我認為你應該好好利用我之前提出的許多意見。我認為，如果你看看市面上的那些模型，你會發現它們在十月的降價之前都非常完美。現在十月要裁員了，所以你得想辦法把這件事處理掉。

But from a margin specifically, being an asset bank, you see some margin variation with -- and you take that plus our growth, it limits what you do in terms of quickly repricing deposits. We tend to take the approach of we see where the market goes and then we slot ourselves appropriately to make sure that we can continue to fund that growth, but obviously help with profitability from kind of long -- as you think about when it recovers, I mean, I think if you look at the past few years and any time we've had the Fed ease, it's pretty quickly, right?

但具體來說，作為一家資產型銀行，利潤率會有一些波動——再加上我們的成長，這限制了我們快速重新定價存款的能力。我們傾向於採取這樣的策略：觀察市場走向，然後做出適當的調整，以確保我們能夠繼續為這種增長提供資金，但顯然也要從長遠角度幫助提高盈利能力——當你思考市場何時復甦時，我的意思是，如果你回顧過去幾年，每次美聯儲放鬆貨幣政策，復甦都很快，對吧？

And I think you can see even on the page on 13, kind of in the middle of that page, you saw the same thing where NIM compressed and then it recovered pretty much next quarter, start to grow again and got back there within a year.

而且我認為，即使在第 13 頁，大概在頁面中間的位置，你也能看到同樣的情況，淨息差壓縮了，然後在下一個季度就恢復了，開始再次增長，並在一年內恢復了正常水平。

And that's really a testament to, one, our deposit team as well as our treasury team, but as well as our kind of our short-term funding nature. So most of our CDs and our brokered deposits are within a year in terms of near kind of terms.

這確實證明了我們的存款團隊和財務團隊的實力，以及我們短期融資的本質。因此，我們的定期存款和經紀存款的期限大多在一年以內，屬於類似的期限。

So it recovers pretty quickly. But again, as I mentioned, I kind of reorient you to net interest income and growth, right? BJ always has this saying that you can't spend margin, that kind of always stuck with me. And at 3.30% margin -- 3.33% margin is pretty healthy. And if you can grow your net interest income quarter-over-quarter despite that margin kind of variation, that's a fantastic story in my mind.

所以它恢復得很快。但是，正如我之前提到的，我還是想讓大家重新專注於淨利息收入和成長，對吧？BJ總是說利潤不能浪費，這句話我一直記在心裡。3.30% 的利潤率——3.33% 的利潤率相當不錯。即使利潤率存在這種波動，如果你的淨利息收入仍能逐季增長，在我看來，那將是一個非常棒的故事。

So we kind of think about that margin but also think about on the net interest income side.

所以我們既要考慮利潤率，也要考慮淨利息收入方面的問題。

Got you. That was very helpful. And I also want to ask about kind of the competition you're seeing broadly in the SBA space with, I guess, the government shutdowns impacting things. You obviously have the credit cycle that seems to be hitting some of your competitors harder than you and all the rule changes that were implemented, I guess, almost two quarters ago. So have you seen easing competition at all? And has that created some opportunities for you?

抓到你了。那很有幫助。我還想問問您在 SBA 領域看到的整體競爭情況，我想，政府停擺肯定對情況產生了影響。顯然，你們的信貸週期似乎對一些競爭對手的影響比你們更大，而且所有規則的改變，我猜，差不多兩個季度前就實施了。那麼，你有沒有看到競爭有所緩和？這是否為你創造了一些機會？

Yes. Tim, this is BJ. The way I would describe it is this is what we do. This is how we grew up, and we know the SBA market, we think, better than anybody. And we've seen tons of things.

是的。提姆，我是BJ。我的描述方式是，這就是我們所做的事情。我們就是這樣長大的，我們認為我們比任何人都更了解 SBA 市場。我們見識過很多事情。

We've seen SOP changes. We've seen government shutdowns. We've seen nonbank lenders come into the market. We've seen nonbank lenders go out of the market. We've seen big banks try to do SBA.

我們已經看到標準操作程序發生了變化。我們已經目睹了政府停擺。我們已經看到非銀行貸款機構進入市場。我們已經看到一些非銀行貸款機構退出了市場。我們已經看到一些大銀行嘗試進行小型企業管理局（SBA）的改革。

We've seen them pull out of SBA. All the while, all we're doing is growing the number of verticals and the number of customers that we serve through the SBA. So we don't believe that we have a peer in SBA lending.

我們已經看到他們退出了美國小型企業管理局（SBA）。同時，我們所做的只是不斷增加透過美國小型企業管理局 (SBA) 服務過的垂直行業數量和客戶數量。因此，我們認為在小型企業管理局貸款領域，我們沒有競爭對手。

We will see different pockets of competition in different verticals and some competitors are better than others in those verticals. But by and large, we actually just control what we can control in terms of making ourselves better all the time every day.

我們會看到不同垂直領域中存在不同的競爭格局，而在這些垂直領域中，有些競爭對手會比其他競爭對手更勝一籌。但總的來說，我們實際上只能控制我們能夠控制的事情，那就是每天不斷地讓自己變得更好。

And so I think, obviously, it's showing up in our results and in our numbers, and we'll continue to do that.

所以我覺得，很明顯，這已經體現在我們的業績和數據中了，我們將繼續這樣做。

Got it. And then the last question I have is, it seems like previously most of your commentary around the credit performance was that it was pretty broad-based and more related to certain vintages rather than industries. But now that we're a little bit longer time for the kind of the impact of tariffs and everything else going on, have you seen any industries that are maybe struggling or under a little bit more pressure than others?

知道了。最後一個問題是，您先前對信貸表現的評論似乎大多比較廣泛，而且與某些年份有關，而不是與行業有關。但現在，關稅和其他因素的影響已經顯現一段時間了，您是否看到某些行業正在苦苦掙扎或面臨比其他行業更大的壓力？

Yes. I think, Tim, on the tariff side, really very little, I'd say. It's a little bit more, yes, the rise in rates and the vintages from '21 and '22 showed some significant stress. I think where we see more stress than not -- and by the way, it's not broad-based across all of our verticals. It's a handful is where they don't have as much pricing power, yet their cost of goods sold are going up.

是的。提姆，我認為，就關稅方面而言，真的沒什麼大不了的。是的，情況稍微好一些，利率上升，而且 2021 年和 2022 年的年份酒也顯示出了一些明顯的壓力。我認為我們看到壓力比沒有壓力的情況要多——順便說一句，這種情況並非普遍存在於我們所有的垂直領域。少數企業缺乏定價權，但其商品銷售成本卻在上升，這確實是一個難題。

And so the struggle of trying to just maintain profitability, and that's where we've seen a little bit of stress. But as Michael kind of talked about, there isn't anything that is surprising us at this point. We kind of know where that tension is. And everything is kind of performing relative to our expectations.

因此，維持獲利能力就成了難題，而這正是我們看到一些壓力。但正如麥可所說，現在沒有什麼事情會讓我們感到驚訝了。我們大概知道這種矛盾點在哪裡。一切基本上都符合我們的預期。

Interesting. Good to know. Thank you for answering my questions.

有趣的。知道了。謝謝您回答我的問題。

Sure.

當然。

David Feaster, Raymond James.

David Feaster，Raymond James。

Hey, good morning everybody. I wanted to talk about the kind of the credit and tech side in one sense. You talked about maintaining strong underwriting and that you guys are going to be going through the risk weighting, updating some of those. I'm just curious, given the broader uncertainty and pressures that we're seeing, again, you talked about the tariffs and all these different things.

嘿，大家早安。我想從某種意義上談談信貸和技術方面的問題。您提到要保持嚴格的承保，並且您將對風險權重進行調整，更新其中的一些權重。我只是好奇，鑑於我們目前面臨的更廣泛的不確定性和壓力，您剛才又談到了關稅以及所有這些不同的事情。

Have you adjusted underwriting standards or your criteria at all? And then using technology and AI, is there -- we talked about the growth side and improving profitability, but is there opportunities to use tech or AI or whatever it may be to help underwriting or earlier credit identification and just kind of help mitigate the credit risk?

你們是否調整過承保標準或審核標準？然後，利用技術和人工智慧，我們談到了成長和提高盈利能力，但是，利用技術、人工智慧或其他任何技術來幫助承保或更早地識別信用，從而幫助降低信用風險，這方面的機會有哪些呢？

Yes. Hey, David, I'll start. Michael, I'm sure will jump in. On underwriting standards, to be pretty consistent with our customers so they understand kind of -- and our lenders so that they understand what we're interested in and what we're not.

是的。嘿，大衛，我先來。我相信邁克爾肯定會參與其中。在承保標準方面，我們要與客戶保持相當的一致性，以便他們能夠理解——也要與我們的貸款機構保持一致，以便他們能夠理解我們感興趣的和不感興趣的。

With that said, though, there will be times when we'll modify the credit box, let's say, for instance, we'll say we really want to require direct management experience or direct operating experience in a certain vertical if we're going to end credit in that vertical.

不過話雖如此，有時我們也會修改信貸標準，比如說，如果我們要終止在某個垂直領域的信貸，我們可能會要求在該垂直領域擁有直接管理經驗或直接營運經驗。

That's an example of how we might tighten underwriting is to make sure that we have borrowers that are going to be able to operate their businesses successfully.

這就是我們收緊貸款核准的一個例子，目的是確保借款人能夠成功經營他們的業務。

So we're constantly tweaking that across our 40 verticals, and we've always done that. And I think that, that will continue. In terms of AI, absolutely. So for instance, one of the things that we're looking at in pilot from a new loan origination and servicing platform is the ability to actually ingest documents and have them read by AI and started to do spreads and create a credit memo. So imagine we've got all this documentation from an HVAC company.

因此，我們一直在 40 個垂直領域中不斷進行調整，而且我們一直都是這樣做的。我認為這還會繼續下去。就人工智慧而言，絕對是如此。例如，我們正在試行一個新的貸款發起和服務平台，其中一個功能是能夠實際接收文檔，並讓 AI 讀取這些文檔，然後開始進行分析並建立貸項通知單。假設我們有來自暖通空調公司的所有文件。

And AI is ingesting all this information specifically on this HVAC customer in a certain market. But at the same time, it's going out and using Copilot or ChatGPT to actually build a business analysis around what that market looks like, what the demand in the market looks like, what the overall industry doing and how it's performing, how that looks relative to the financials that we're ingesting, how that looks like relative to our existing HVAC or service contractor portfolio that we have in credit. That's what we're piloting. Those are the types of things that we're looking at in terms of using AI. So it doesn't replace the human aspect of reviewing all that.

人工智慧正在專門針對特定市場中的這位暖通空調客戶收集所有這些資訊。但同時，它也正在利用 Copilot 或 ChatGPT 等工具，圍繞市場現狀、市場需求、整個行業的狀況和表現，以及這些情況與我們正在收集的財務數據、與我們現有的 HVAC 或服務承包商信貸組合之間的關係，建立業務分析。這就是我們正在試行的項目。這些就是我們在人工智慧應用方面正在研究的領域。所以它並不能取代人工審核所有這些內容。

But in terms of streamlining the ability to analyze, do data entry, ingest information, do competitive analysis and understand trends, it's going to be incredibly impactful for our ability to get loans closed, approved, not approved, and it's just going to make us a lot better and give customer a lot better experience.

但就簡化分析、資料輸入、資訊收集、競爭分析和了解趨勢的能力而言，這將對我們完成貸款審批、批准或不批准的能力產生巨大的影響，這將使我們變得更好，並為客戶提供更好的體驗。

Okay. That's helpful. And then I was hoping you could maybe elaborate a bit on the government shutdown and kind of how all this works. I appreciate your commentary on this already. But it sounds like assuming that this gets figured out pretty quickly that you think that you're still going to be able to kind of sustain this pace of organic growth quarter-over-quarter.

好的。那很有幫助。然後，我希望您能詳細解釋一下政府停擺以及這一切是如何運作的。我非常感謝您對此的評論。但聽起來，假設這個問題能很快解決，你認為你仍然能夠維持這種季度環比的自然成長速度。

I mean, does that imply that the SBA works through the backlog of loans pretty quickly once we get back up and running? Or do you backfill maybe some of that gap with more conventional lending in the short term? Or just do we -- is it kind of just a timing issue and maybe this quarter might be a little bit weaker and we see some slippage into 2026? Just kind of curious how you think about all -- there's a lot of uncertainty. So just any help on how you think this kind of plays out is helpful.

我的意思是，這是否意味著一旦我們恢復正常運轉，美國小型企業管理局就能很快處理完積壓的貸款？或者，您是否考慮在短期內透過更傳統的貸款方式來填補部分資金缺口？或者，這只是時間問題，也許本季業績會稍微疲軟，導致部分業績下滑至 2026 年？我只是有點好奇你對這一切是怎麼想的——有很多不確定因素。所以，如果您能就此事如何發展提供一些建議，那就太好了。

Hey, David, it's Walt. I'll start. I think you -- from the SBA's perspective, once the government opens, they're pretty quick to catch up. I don't really see if it wraps up here in the next, call it, week or two, I really don't see an impact really government shutdown driven on our SBA growth or production for the quarter, largely because of pulling the PLPs towards the end of September, like I mentioned.

嘿，大衛，我是沃特。我先來。我認為——從美國小型企業管理局的角度來看，一旦政府重新開放，他們就能很快趕上進度。我不太看好這件事能否在接下來的一兩週內結束，我真的不認為政府停擺會對我們本季的 SBA 成長或生產產生什麼影響，這主要是因為我們在 9 月底就撤回了 PLP，就像我之前提到的那樣。

You might want to explain what pulling the PLP.

你可能需要解釋為什麼有人會拉PLP。

Yeah, pulling the PLP. So the SBA has a certain amount that they'll allocate each year in terms of funding. Pulling the PLP reserves, it's -- every SBA loan has an SBA PLP number. It's a reservation for that funding from the SBA program. So you can't originate an SBA loan without that SBA number, that authorization.

沒錯，拉攏PLP。因此，美國小型企業管理局每年都會撥出一定金額的資金用於資助。提取 PLP 儲備金，因為－每筆 SBA 貸款都有一個 SBA PLP 編號。這是為獲得美國小型企業管理局 (SBA) 專案資金而預留的資金。所以，如果沒有 SBA 編號或授權，你就無法申請 SBA 貸款。

So -- but you have to be a preferred lender, yes, that's PLP, preferred lender program to find acronym, which I'm known to use quite a bit of acronyms. But yes, from -- David, from kind of growth standpoint, really don't expect much of a change here in the last quarter if they wrap it up here in the next, call it, week or two. I don't think we'll need to tap into the conventional side.

所以——但是你必須是優選貸款機構，是的，那是 PLP，優選貸款機構計劃，這是一個縮寫詞，我經常使用縮寫詞。但是，是的，從成長的角度來看，David，如果他們能在接下來的一兩週內完成這項工作，那麼預計最後一個季度不會有太大的變化。我認為我們不需要動用傳統手段。

That's always something we do for a much more extended shutdown if we run out of those kind of SBA reservations, and that's where Michael and his team come in, and we'll look at small short-term bridge loans. But overall, this is, like I said, unfortunately, something that we've kind of gotten used to on how to deal.

如果 SBA 的這類預留資金用完，導致停工時間延長，我們通常會採取這種措施，這時麥可和他的團隊就會介入，我們會考慮小額短期過渡貸款。但總的來說，就像我說的，不幸的是，我們已經有點習慣如何應對這種情況了。

And the other -- last thing I'd say is we have government relations manager that sits up in D.C. Her name is Dawn Thompson, she's fantastic. She lets us know kind of what's going on, as it's going on. So we kind of feel like we are always kind of in the know on how things are progressing, and she's keeping us up to date daily at this point.

最後我想說的是，我們有一位政府關係經理，她常駐華盛頓特區。她的名字叫道恩湯普森，她非常出色。她會即時告訴我們正在發生的事情。所以我們感覺自己總是能了解事情的進展情況，而且她現在每天都會向我們報告最新進展。

Okay. That's helpful. And then maybe just kind of staying on some of the exciting parts about the business. You guys -- I wanted to get an update on kind of where we are with the embedded finance build-out, how that's going and the growth potential there? And then just maybe on -- you guys are kind of ahead of the curve on most things.

好的。那很有幫助。然後，也許可以重點談談這個行業裡一些令人興奮的部分。各位－我想了解嵌入式金融建設的最新進展，進展如何，以及該領域的成長潛力？而且，或許你們在大多數方面都走在了時代的前沿。

How do you think about -- like just given the market expansion of stable coin, how do you expect to play there? Are there opportunities like just kind of curious what you guys are looking at? Is that a potential opportunity for some deposit growth for you all? Just want to touch on those two topics.

鑑於穩定幣市場正在擴張，您打算如何參與其中？你們在關注哪些機會？我只是有點好奇。對你們來說，這是否是一個潛在的存款成長機會？我只想簡單談談這兩個主題。

Sure. David, it's BJ. So embedded continues to be built out, and we think it's one of our moonshots. So something that really could be meaningful over the next three to five years. We did do a pivot on how we were building it out earlier in the year.

當然。大衛，我是BJ。因此，嵌入式系統正在不斷發展，我們認為它是我們的登月計劃之一。所以，這在未來三到五年內可能會產生非常有意義的影響。今年早些時候，我們確實調整了建造方式。

We were doing a lot of in-house building. But again, with AI and what's going on in the marketplace, and we found a partner that was quite a bit ahead of where we were, and we thought that we could leverage that partnership to accelerate our embedded banking growth. So we kind of moved to a different platform, which slowed down our pipeline building in terms of relationships. But we've got one live. We've got several in the hopper.

我們當時做了很多內部建設工作。但是，隨著人工智慧和市場的發展，我們找到了一個比我們領先很多的合作夥伴，我們認為可以利用這種合作關係來加速我們的嵌入式銀行業務成長。因此，我們轉向了不同的平台，這減緩了我們在建立關係方面的通路建立速度。但我們已經有一個活生生的了。我們有好幾個項目正在籌備中。

And we think over time, we'll talk about that a little bit more. I'd rather actually put points on the board from an embedded banking perspective and then tell you about it as opposed to tell you it's coming. So that's kind of where we are on embedded. It's still very much on our road map. On stable coins, it's very interesting.

我們認為隨著時間的推移，我們會更多地談論這個問題。我寧願從嵌入式銀行的角度把要點擺出來，然後再告訴你，而不是告訴你它即將到來。這就是我們目前在嵌入式系統的進展。這仍然是我們發展規劃中的重要一環。穩定幣方面，情況非常有趣。

We have a new Board member, Patrick McHenry, who you would have seen in press release that when he was in Washington and Congress, he was incredibly involved in the GENIUS Act and what's going on with stablecoins.

我們有一位新的董事會成員，派崔克·麥克亨利。您可能在新聞稿中看到，當他在華盛頓和國會任職時，他非常積極地參與了《天才法案》以及穩定幣的發展。

And so we kind of have an inside view, so to speak, of what's going on, how that could impact things and what -- how people are looking to use it. So we are actively studying how we would participate in stablecoins, and we want to stay ahead of that curve as much as we can as it continues to evolve.

因此，可以說我們對正在發生的事情、可能的影響以及人們希望如何使用它，都有了一種內部視角。因此，我們正在積極研究如何參與穩定幣，並希望盡可能地走在穩定幣發展的前沿。

Okay, that's helpful. Thanks everybody.

好的，這很有幫助。謝謝大家。

(Operator Instructions)

（操作說明）

Steve Alexopoulos, TD Cowen.

史蒂夫·亞歷克索普洛斯，TD Cowen。

This is Bill Young actually on for Steve. Just to circle on the credit mini cycle topic one more time. In recent quarters, you've spoken of being more aggressive on getting ahead of problem loans and writing them off with more aggressive charge-offs in your book.

這是比爾楊代替史蒂夫上場。再簡單回顧一下信用微型循環這個主題。最近幾個季度，您曾表示要更加積極主動地處理問題貸款，並在帳簿上採取更積極的核銷措施來註銷這些貸款。

And we did see a bigger step down in net charge-offs this quarter despite the increase in NPAs. So can you speak to your visibility on kind of the future loss trajectory and your confidence level in terms of how far ahead you've gotten on these issues so far this cycle?

儘管不良貸款有所增加，但本季淨沖銷額確實出現了更大幅度的下降。那麼，您能否談談您對未來損失軌蹟的預見性，以及您對本輪週期以來在這些問題上取得的進展程度的信心？

Yeah. I think that -- it's Michael here. I'll take that. So I think in past quarters, we had discussed the fact that we had changed our philosophy on being more proactive in charging off loans. Our special assets team is -- in spirit with the SBA program does everything that we can to help our business -- our borrowers navigate whatever challenges are in front of them.

是的。我想——這裡是麥可。我接受。所以我認為在過去的幾個季度裡，我們已經討論過，我們改變了在註銷貸款方面更加積極主動的理念。我們的特殊資產團隊秉承 SBA 計畫的精神，竭盡所能幫助我們的企業——我們的借款人——應對他們面臨的任何挑戰。

So we will hold on with our customers longer than most and do everything we can to help. In the past, we had held some of those in nonaccrual and not charged them off. We changed our philosophy. We're charging them off when we feel like it's past the point of getting back to repayment quickly. While even though those loans are not charged off, they're not out of mind.

因此，我們將比大多數公司更長時間地陪伴我們的客戶，並盡一切努力幫助他們。過去，我們曾將其中一些項目列為非應計項目，而沒有將其沖銷。我們改變了理念。當我們覺得無法迅速恢復還款時，我們會將欠款註銷。雖然這些貸款沒有被註銷，但它們並沒有被遺忘。

We track those loans. We still work with our customers. But -- so I would say that we are right on top of where we should be as far as charge-offs. We'll continue to be proactive in dealing with that and not let them linger on our balance sheet. But I think we're doing a good job there.

我們會追蹤這些貸款。我們仍然與客戶保持合作。但是——所以我認為，就壞帳核銷而言，我們目前的情況完全符合預期。我們將繼續積極主動地處理這些問題，不會讓它們長期影響我們的資產負債表。但我認為我們在那裡做得很好。

Okay. Great. And then it was nice to see the return on tangible common equity return back to double digits this quarter. So can you just maybe lay out what you see as kind of a sustainable path for returns can move to in the next year or two?

好的。偉大的。令人欣慰的是，本季有形普通股股東權益報酬率重回兩位數。那麼，您能否大致闡述您認為未來一兩年內，收益可以朝哪個方向永續發展？

Yeah. I think, Billy, what we talk about a lot here is getting to a 15% and 15%, which is consistent and sustainable 15% returns on equity with 15% or more EPS growth a year. And to do that, you've got to make sure that your business model can sustain that kind of performance, which means doing things around the checking portfolio to provide more of a balance for your funding costs. It is always having growth initiatives like Live Oak Express that are going to incrementally move your fee income line up further. It looks like expense discipline and a moderation of credit.

是的。比利，我認為我們在這裡經常討論的是如何達到 15% 和 15% 的目標，即持續且可持續的 15% 的股本回報率，以及每年 15% 或更高的每股收益增長。要做到這一點，你必須確保你的商業模式能夠維持這種業績，這意味著圍繞支票帳戶組合採取一些措施，以更好地平衡你的資金成本。像 Live Oak Express 這樣的成長計劃總是能夠逐步提升你的費用收入。看起來像是控制開支和節制信貸。

All of those things, the senior leadership team talks about constantly is how do we get back not only to those levels, but consistently build a business model that stays at those levels. And so I'm highly confident that we're going to be able to get there in the near term, near medium term, let's say, over the next 18 to 24 months.

所有這些事情，高階領導團隊一直在討論的是如何不僅回到那些水平，而且還要持續建立一個能夠保持在那些水平的商業模式。因此，我非常有信心，我們能夠在近期、中近期，比如說未來 18 到 24 個月內實現這一目標。

Great. And my last question, with your pending Apiture sale and some activity among your peers such as MVB with their Victor sale, as you think about Live Oak Ventures and some potential percolation of activity in Silicon Valley, are you beginning to see a bigger opportunity in the near term to harvest some of your investments?

偉大的。最後一個問題，鑑於您即將出售 Apiture，以及您的同行（例如 MVB 出售 Victor）的一些活動，考慮到 Live Oak Ventures 和矽谷一些潛在的活動，您是否開始看到近期內有更大的機會來收回部分投資？

I'll talk a little bit about ventures, our ventures portfolio specifically, but Chip knows more than any of us about broadly what's going on in ventures. So I'll let him talk about that. But Apiture was one of the two largest portfolio companies that we had in our ventures portfolio. And obviously, we just exited with a nice gain there. The other largest that we have is Greenlight Technologies, which is a fantastic company.

我會簡單談談創投，特別是我們的創投投資組合，但 Chip 比我們任何人都更了解創投領域的整體情況。那就讓他說說吧。但 Apiture 是我們創投組合中最大的兩家公司之一。顯然，我們這筆交易獲利頗豐。我們旗下另一家規模最大的公司是 Greenlight Technologies，這是一家非常棒的公司。

The other ones are smaller and still in growth mode. And so I think Apiture was probably kind of the largest in terms of harvesting. And the portfolio will probably stay the way it is for quite some time. In terms of -- in terms of exits, I think that we'll continue to incrementally add venture portfolio companies as we continue to look at new technology that we want to use inside the company. That's always been what we use Live Oak Ventures for.

其他的則較小，仍在生長階段。所以我覺得就收成而言，Apiture 可能是最大的。而且，該投資組合很可能在相當長的一段時間內維持現狀。就退出而言，我認為我們會繼續逐步增加創投組合公司，同時繼續專注於我們想要在公司內部使用的新技術。我們一直以來都用 Live Oak Ventures 來做這件事。

And so you'll probably see more of that from us. But Apiture was probably the largest exit that you'll see in a while. Chip, what are you seeing more broadly?

所以你們可能會看到我們推出更多類似的產品。但 Apiture 可能是你近期能看到的最大規模的退出事件。Chip，你從更廣泛的角度觀察到了什麼？

Well, I think most of this relates to Canopy. We look at probably four companies a day in Canopy. So that gives Live Oak a sneak peek before anybody else if there's anything interesting there that we may want to invest in.

嗯，我認為這大部分都與 Canopy 有關。在 Canopy 中，我們每天大概會查看四家公司。這樣一來，如果有什麼值得我們投資的有趣項目，Live Oak 就能比其他人先睹為快。

I would say that the euphoria of the pricing in that business after COVID has reinstated itself with artificial intelligence. Venture firms are throwing enormous amount of money at these companies where they're fundamentally pre-revenue.

我認為，新冠疫情後該產業定價的繁榮景像已經隨著人工智慧的出現而重現。創投公司正在向這些尚未產生收入的公司投入巨額資金。

And we're trying to take a bit of a circumspect view there because as you know, at Canopy, we raised $1.5 billion from 70 banks and our bank LPs are right there by our side as we look at interesting opportunities on a daily basis.

我們對此持謹慎態度，因為正如您所知，Canopy 從 70 家銀行籌集了 15 億美元，我們的銀行有限合夥人每天都在我們身邊，與我們一起尋找有趣的投資機會。

Great, thank you for taking my questions guys.

太好了，謝謝各位回答我的問題。

Thanks, Billy.

謝謝你，比利。

There are no further questions at this time. I will now hand the call back over to Chairman and CEO, Chip Mahan, for final comments.

目前沒有其他問題了。現在我將把電話交還給董事長兼執行長奇普·馬漢，請他做最後的總結發言。

As always, thanks for attending, and we'll see you in 90 days.

和往常一樣，感謝各位的參與，我們90天後再見。

Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. The conference has now ended. Thank you all for joining. You may all disconnect your lines.

謝謝各位女士、先生。會議已經結束。感謝各位的參與。你們可以斷開線路了。