First Commonwealth Financial Corporation Q4 2025 Earnings Call - NIM Near 4% and $225M Loan Sale Clears Path for Buybacks

Jordan, Conference Operator: Thank you for standing by. My name is Jordan, and I’ll be your conference operator today. At this time, I’d like to welcome everyone to the First Commonwealth Financial Corporation fourth quarter 2025 earnings release conference call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speaker’s remarks, there will be a question and answer session. If you’d like to ask a question during this time, simply press star followed by the number 1 on your telephone keypad. If you’d like to withdraw your question, press star 1 again. Thank you. I’d now like to turn the call over to Ryan Thomas, Vice President of Finance and Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Ryan Thomas, Vice President of Finance and Investor Relations, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Thank you, Jordan, and good afternoon, everyone. Thanks for joining us today to discuss First Commonwealth Financial Corporation’s fourth quarter financial results. Participating on today’s call will be Mike Price, President and CEO, Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, Jane Grebenc, Bank President and Chief Revenue Officer, Brian Sohocki, Chief Credit Officer, and Mike McCuen, Chief Lending Officer. As a reminder, a copy of yesterday’s earnings release can be accessed by logging on to fcbanking.com and selecting the Investor Relations link at the top of the page. We have also included a slide presentation on our investor relations website with supplemental information that will be referenced during today’s call. Before we begin, I need to caution listeners that this call will contain forward-looking statements.

Please refer to our forward-looking statements disclaimer on page 3 of the slide presentation for a description of risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those reflected in the forward-looking statement. Today’s call will also include non-GAAP financial measures. Non-GAAP financial measures should be viewed in addition to, and not as an alternative for, our reported results prepared in accordance with GAAP. A reconciliation of these measures can be found in the appendix of today’s slide presentation. With that, I will turn the call over to Mike.

Mike Price, President and CEO, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Hey, thank you, Ryan, and welcome everyone. Headline performance numbers for the fourth quarter include core EPS of $0.43 per share, which beat consensus earnings estimates alongside a net interest margin that expanded to 3.98%, a core ROA of 1.45%, and a core efficiency ratio of 52.8%. During the fourth quarter, average deposits and total loans grew modestly at 2.8% and 1.2% respectively, due to seasonal headwinds and several larger commercial loan payoffs. Net interest income grew as the margin expanded on the heels of healthy new commercial loan volume at good rates. Deposit costs fell one basis point to 1.83%. Fee income was flat as gains in SBA were offset by seasonal declines in wealth and mortgage.

Our fee income at 18% of total revenue compares favorably to peers, and we have a concerted effort and long-term focus on growing fee income through our regional banking model. Wages and incentives remained pressured due to market conditions. The provision for credit losses decreased by $4.3 million compared to last quarter to $7 million. The elevated prior quarter provision was reflective of the continued resolution of a previously disclosed dealer floor plan credit. The credit required no further reserve in the fourth quarter. While NPLs increased four basis points to 94 basis points versus the prior quarter, we are appropriately reserved for these loans and did not experience a provision impact like the third quarter. Non-performing loans include both the unguaranteed portion of SBA loans and the government-guaranteed portion of any SBA loan which is owned by the bank.

As of December 31, 2025, $98 million of non-performing loans included $39.2 million of total SBA loans, of which $31.2 million was government guaranteed. As a result of our ninety-four basis points of NPLs, thirty-two basis points is guaranteed. In the fourth quarter, we repurchased $23.1 million of our stock, or 1.4 million shares at $15.94 per share. We repurchased 2.1 million shares in total in 2025, which incidentally is roughly two-thirds of the 3 million shares we issued in the Center Bank acquisition.

For the year, core EPS of $1.53 compares favorably to the consensus earnings estimates of $1.40 that was in place in December of 2024, as well as the highest revised mid-year consensus estimate of $1.54. Net interest income of $427.5 million in 2025 was up an impressive $47.2 million year-over-year. While net interest income benefited in general from higher for longer interest rates, more specifically, net interest income was driven by better loan yields, good loan volumes, lower deposit costs, and a better commercial business mix. All this mixed together drove the NIM markedly higher over last year. Loan growth was 8.2% annualized and 5% without the CenterBank acquisition as commercial banking......

Equipment finance and indirect led the way. Average deposit growth of 6.1% for the year largely kept pace with loan growth and was approximately 4.2% without CenterBank. Here, money market and CDs accounted for over $534 million in growth, while non-interest-bearing DDA added another $116 million to a now $10.3 billion depository. For the year, non-interest income fell only $3 million year over year, despite another $6.3 million in Durbin amendment debit card headwinds that resulted from crossing $10 billion in assets. In short, our fee businesses are filling the gap.

In sum, 2025 was a year in which strong growth and spread in fee income more than offset the impact of higher expenses and lost Durbin interchange income, resulting in year-over-year improvements in PPNR, core EPS, core ROA, and efficiency. During the year, and oh, by the way, the team completed the acquisition of CenterBank and grew deposits 3% annually for the year. Before I turn the call over to Jim, I wanted to take a moment to recognize Jane Grebenc, who will be retiring at the end of March. Jane has been a friend and a mentor to me and many other leaders throughout her distinguished career, and she has left an indelible mark on First Commonwealth. Jane’s dedication, leadership and wisdom have played a pivotal role in the strategic transformations that have helped position First Commonwealth as a top quartile performer.

Thank you, Jane. And with that, I will turn it over to Jim Reske, our CFO.

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Thanks, Mike. Core operating results for the fourth quarter of 2025 continued the momentum of the third quarter. Core ROA improved 11 basis points to 1.45%, and core ROTCE improved 93 basis points to 15.83%. Spread income increased $2.1 million from the previous quarter, primarily due to a 6 basis point increase in the net interest margin. The yield on earning assets increased 3 basis points, while the cost of funds decreased 3 basis points. Looking ahead, our NIM guidance is little changed from last quarter. A near-term dip as our margin through our variable rate loans fully reflects fourth quarter rate cuts, followed by gradual improvement each quarter, ending the year 2026 at around 4%. At year-end, we designated a portfolio of approximately $225 million in commercial loans as held for sale.

These loans represent a pool of commercial loans that were originated primarily in our Philadelphia MSA, which the bank had previously decided to exit in order to focus the bank’s resources on customers in other areas. Subsequent to that decision and communication to borrowers, a bank approached us with an offer to purchase the portfolio. Since discussions regarding that sale are ongoing, we moved the portfolio to held for sale as of year-end. The ongoing effect in 2026, should the sale be consummated, would be to reinvest the cash proceeds from the sale of $225 million in loans into lower yielding securities at a rate differential of approximately 1.5%. The sale, if consummated, will also have the ancillary benefit of improving our liquidity and our capital ratios.

As Mike mentioned, total average deposits increased $72 million or 2.8% annualized over last quarter. Seasonal outflows in public funds were more than offset by growth in consumer checking and time deposits, along with growth in small business and corporate money market deposits. Core non-interest income of $24.3 million decreased $200,000 from the previous quarter. SBA gain on sale income increased by $800,000, but this was more than offset by a $700,000 decrease in wealth advisory fees and a $200,000 decrease in swap fees. In 2026, we expect non-interest income to be relatively flat over 2025. So longer term, as Mike mentioned, we would expect our regional model to improve the income results.

Core non-interest expense of $74.3 million increased $1.7 million from the previous quarter, mostly due to increases in salaries and benefits as we filled a number of open positions in the fourth quarter. The bank, however, was able to achieve positive operating leverage over last quarter. The core efficiency ratio remained below 53%, and we expect to be able to limit operating cost increases to approximately 3% year-over-year looking ahead. Mike mentioned our buyback activity in the fourth quarter. I would add that remaining repurchase capacity under the current program was $22.7 million as of December 31, 2025. On top of that, an additional $25 million of share repurchase authority was authorized by our board yesterday.

Of course, we only repurchase shares using excess capital generation in any given quarter, which effectively caps repurchase activity at approximately $25 million-$30 million per quarter. And with that, we’ll take any questions you may have.

Jordan, Conference Operator: At this time, I’d like to remind everyone, in order to ask a question, press star, then the number one on your telephone keypad. We’ll take a brief moment to compile the Q&A roster. Your first question comes from the line of Daniel Tamayo from Raymond James. Your line is live.

Daniel Tamayo, Analyst, Raymond James: Thank you. Good afternoon to everyone. Congratulations to Jane on your retirement. I guess first on the, pardon me. On the credit side, and I apologize, I don’t think I heard anything, but if I did, I apologize if I missed it. But just curious, you know, you did, Mike, touch on the impact of the SBA guaranteed and the NPLs. But just thoughts on where the net charge-offs and provision might go in 2026, and then if you have any update on the floor plan loan that had been giving you guys some issues, where that stands at the end of the quarter as well. Thanks.

Mike Price, President and CEO, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Yeah, the charge-off guidance we normally give is 25-30 basis points, and the floor plan credit, we have maybe $1.5 million left to resolve. Is that right, Brian?

Brian Sohocki, Chief Credit Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Yeah, I’ll jump in there. Thanks, Mike. First, I’ll just start in the fourth quarter for the dealer floor plan loan. We ended the year with a $2.5 million outstanding balance, so we’re nearing resolution with just a number of cars left in the liquidation process. There was no additional reserve, as noted previously, and we have a, you know, just a small release, about $80,000 in the quarter. Since you mentioned the net charge-offs, there was a $2.1 million charge in the fourth quarter, related to the dealer floor plan loan. And, you know, within that, 47 basis points that was reported on an annualized basis.

And I concur with Mike’s guidance on the forecast moving forward.

Daniel Tamayo, Analyst, Raymond James: Okay, great. Thanks, guys. As it relates to the provision or reserves, with the reserves coming out over the last couple of quarters, does this feel like a pretty good run rate, like, for stability, just over 1.30, or you think that that still can trickle down?

Brian Sohocki, Chief Credit Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Yeah. I wouldn’t say there’s any change in our philosophy. You know, credit costs remain manageable. Reserve levels remain strong, consistent with peers, slightly ahead in some cases at the 1.32. You know, where we’ve seen emerging stress, we’ve already responded. You know, whether that’s through the specific reserves in prior quarters, we’ve kept our qualitative overlays in place. And overall, you know, comfortable that the reserve’s just appropriate, reflecting where the risk is in the portfolio.

Daniel Tamayo, Analyst, Raymond James: Okay, thanks. And maybe just changing gears here, but just as it relates to the loan sale that you’re expecting here, probably near term, you know, is that something you could see happening more in 2026 in terms of additional loans being moved off the balance sheet, or is this kind of a one-off situation that you don’t see recurring?

Mike Price, President and CEO, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: It’s more of a one-off. We really withdrew from that market, our branches and kind of our C&I commercial banking depository ground game. And about two years ago, we sent customers letters, and this is kind of, you know, really one of the last acts of the play. Mike McCuen is our Chief Banking Officer. He’s on the line. Do you want to add anything for Daniel, Michael?

Mike McCuen, Chief Lending Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: No, I think you covered it, Mike. Taking those resources that Jim alluded to, investing in the other markets that we have, our retail locations, makes all the sense in the world for our business model.

Daniel Tamayo, Analyst, Raymond James: Okay, terrific. Thanks for the color, guys. Appreciate it.

Mike Price, President and CEO, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Thank you.

Jordan, Conference Operator: Your next question comes from the line of Karl Shepard from RBC Capital Markets. Your line is live.

Karl Shepard, Analyst, RBC Capital Markets: Good afternoon, and congrats, Jane. I guess I wanted to start on your loan growth expectations. It looks like you had pretty good production in some of the segments maybe you’re targeting, and then you had the payoff headwinds. I guess just kind of what’s the buildup for loan growth in 2026 and just kind of talk about maybe health of the pipelines and what you’re seeing in your markets?

Mike Price, President and CEO, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Yeah, I think, you know, last year we grew 8%, 5% without, 5% without CenterBank, and I would expect that kind of loan growth to continue, although we really had, elevated, payoffs, probably in excess of over $200 million from the second half of the year to the first half of the year. So that created some palpable headwinds. You know, we feel like our, our business banking, mortgage could have a good year, although we’ll sell that. And really, we just feel good about our commercial pipelines, commercial real estate and elsewhere. You know, we had really let our construction portfolio, attrite, and we feel that is going to build and add probably $20+ million of, drawdowns a month. We feel like we’re well positioned.

You know, typically, the first and the fourth quarter are a little slower for us than the second or third, and that’s where we get most of our loan growth in a given year.

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: ... but the payoffs are indeed a little elevated, and but I suspect, just like we were here last year, I think we probably guided to maybe 5-7, and we got to 5. And then that’s, again, without the CenterBank. And I think we’re well positioned, and our teams are maturing, and we’re just, I think we get a little better every year.

Karl Shepard, Analyst, RBC Capital Markets: Okay. And then, I guess maybe one for Jim, just on the buyback, quite a bit of authorization out there now, and the stock’s a little bit higher than maybe where it was in 4Q when you’re active. Just how do you want us to think about that?

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Yeah, it’s really more about capital deployment right now. There is a price sensitivity to it. We always operate on a grid so that we can and we use the same words every time. We want to keep a little bit of dry powder available if prices dip. That’s kind of why, if you look back in calendar year 2025, for a good part of the year, we weren’t, we weren’t buying back anything, and then the later part of the year, we stepped up the buybacks. But right now, the capital ratios, we’re just generating so much capital to easily self-capitalize loan growth at the level we want it. So if our future guidance is mid-single digits, we’re generating far more capital than it takes to capitalize that kind of loan growth.

We don’t want to, and I’ll repeat myself, I know we’ve said this, guys, before, but we don’t want to accelerate loan growth beyond what we think we can organically do. We do it at the right pace for our region, for our credit appetite, for our demographics, based on the rate environment. For all those reasons, the loan growth rate is where we want it to be, and then we still generate a ton of capital. We have to do something with that other than just let the capital ratios go up, up, up. That’s why we are doing the buyback, and we’ll continue to do more this year.

Karl Shepard, Analyst, RBC Capital Markets: Thank you.

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Thank you.

Jordan, Conference Operator: Your next question comes from the line of Kelly Motta from KBW. Your line is live.

Kelly Motta, Analyst, KBW: Hi, good afternoon. Thanks for the questions, and congrats, Shane, on your retirement. Just, just to start off, I’d love to kick it off on margin. It came in quite a bit above where I had been expecting. You guys noted you had some, some payoffs. I’m just wondering if there was any loan fees in there, or if that’s a good run rate to go off of. And as we look ahead, you know, I appreciate the commentary about the reinvestment from the HFS portfolio when that closes, but how we should be thinking about these dynamics here. Thank you.

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Yeah. Kelly, Jim. Hey, great question. Thanks. Yeah, we were really pleased with the margin performance this quarter as well. We, you may recall last quarter, we were giving guidance that we expected a dip. And first thought when we saw that margin coming in so strongly was, is the dip actually happening the way we thought it was going to happen? And it did. It did. So the rate cuts hit the variable rate loan portfolio, the SOFR-based loan portfolio, and took that down. But you nailed it. We had some other things that offset that. And the part you nailed is we had some payoffs, and we had some paydowns in loans that were previously on non-accrual status.

When they did that, some of the previously we recognized the interest on those loans that had been on non-accrual. So that and some other factors together worked together to offset that hit we took in the variable growth portfolio and kept the margin performance really strong in the fourth quarter. But looking ahead, we think that you know the Fed cut rates a couple of times here in the fourth quarter in December. That’s not fully reflected yet. We’re going to feel that in the SOFR-based loan portfolio, the variable portfolio. So that’s going to hit in the first quarter, dip it down a little bit, but then all the other factors that have been working to keep it going strong, the continued upward repricing of the fixed-rate loans, the macro swaps coming off the book.

Here, the remainder of that in 2026, including a big chunk in May, that’ll really help keep the margin up. And so that’s why we kind of have this forecast of drifting upward to around the 4% level in 2026. So I hope that gives you some additional-

Kelly Motta, Analyst, KBW: No, that, that is, that’s super helpful. Maybe, turning to the expenses, you know, Q4, it, it was up about $1.5 billion, I think. Just wondering if that was just kind of year-end true-ups, and then, as we think ahead, how you guys are, seems like you’re, you’re calling for, you know, pretty strong margin here, solid loan growth. So as we look ahead, your expectation for expenses, any places you’re hiring, and, and how we should think about that run rate? Thanks.

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Just the efficiency was certainly on the back of the revenue side. We’re normally very, very good at the expense side in maintaining operating leverage, and we have a nice little chart in our investor deck that shows that we’re pretty good at putting our shoulder to the wheel. We’ll need to do that and hustle this year, watch our FTE count closely. That being said, we’ve invested pretty heavily in our commercial bank, our equipment finance group, and we expect more production there, and we expect for those investments to pay off for us. But we can do a little better job on the expense side as well, and we’ve invested pretty heavily, quite frankly, the last two years.

I think, yeah, $25 million or so, yeah, up over 2 years, and we were a little higher than we thought we would be, but that’s just a matter of discipline, and we’re a pretty disciplined group. And Kelly, you know, you mentioned there were true ups. There were a couple of things that were one-off that hit us in the fourth quarter that are not-... part of our thinking going forward. So we have some contract terminations and some other things in addition to what we said in our prepared remarks about filling open positions, what Mike talked about, about the staffing increases. So a couple of those, one officer not, you know, in our future forecast for operating expense going forward.

Kelly Motta, Analyst, KBW: Great. Thanks for the color. I’ll step back.

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Thank you.

Jordan, Conference Operator: Your next question comes from the line of Matthew Breese from Stephens Inc. Your line is live.

Matthew Breese, Analyst, Stephens Inc.: Hey, good afternoon.

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Good afternoon, Matt.

Matthew Breese, Analyst, Stephens Inc.: I had a couple of questions. Maybe first starting with the NIM, you know, it sounds like the guidance is calling for around a 4% NIM by the end of the year, and I’m usually just a bit skeptical of the sustainability of 4% NIMs. And one thing we’ve been hearing a lot about this quarter is spread compression, both on the C&I and CRE front. So I guess I had a two-part question, which is, you know, one, how does the pipeline yield look? And what are you getting for spreads on new C&I and commercial real estate business? And then maybe just touch on expectations around deposit costs for 2026.

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Yeah, I’ll hand it over to Mike McCuen in a minute for the loan expectations. But, I mean, when I look at our commercial variable and the new stuff we’re putting on, it’s 7.3% in the last quarter, and commercial fixed is in the high 60s. Even our indirect is in the high 60s. So and that’s like kind of at that 2.5-year point on the shoulder of the yield curve, and we like that. And so, I don’t know, replacement rates still look good. Even with rates down this past quarter, our commercial variable, the replacement rate was low, but nevertheless, it was still positive.

Yeah, I think just I’ll interject quickly, and then Mike McCuen, turn it over to you for just thoughts on the market, the spread, and the spread compression, to give that kind of real-time color. But in the fourth quarter, we didn’t see a real differential on the rates we worked from a variable rate portfolio, the ones that were coming on, coming off. So that said, like from a, in the aggregate, there wasn’t evidence of a lot of spread compression in that portfolio. What Mike was talking about is all the fixed rate loans still nicely repricing upward. And because those are all repricing towards the middle of the curve, if the yield curve flexes a little bit, the drop at the short end won’t affect that dynamic a whole lot. And I think, Matt, we’ve talked about that before, so.

But that’s the—just the variable rate portfolio, the ones that came on, came off, it was like a one basis point differential in the fourth quarter. So not a lot of evidence on that natural level of spread compression, but I’ll turn it over to Mike McCuen to approve.

Mike McCuen, Chief Lending Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Yeah, just to answer specifically on the segments. I would start with our business lending to the family-owned owner-operated business. We put a real focus on that about a year ago, and we’re seeing healthy growth in that segment. I would say that’s a prime flow space business. I don’t see that changing from a spread perspective. Secondly, equipment finance group, they’re doing mostly fixed-rate loans. Their yields are holding up pretty well. And then thirdly, I would say the commercial real estate business, that’s a little trickier because as probably you heard from others, agency markets, the insurance markets are very aggressive these days. We have a pretty healthy pipeline, and we have a number of construction loans that are converting to permanent markets.

The balancing act is those spreads are compressed, and we’re trying to maintain our discipline around the real estate business, not just from a rate perspective, but also from a structure, term, recourse, all those things that go into those decisions. As our construction loans roll off, we have every chance to match those rates. We, in many cases, choose not to and let those move on and then grow the construction loan portfolio, which, by the way, is up around $120 million over the last year, and that will lead to future funding. So that’s a quick snapshot of why we’re a little more comfortable based on the segments that we play in versus large corporate investment grade things like that. Yeah.

Matthew Breese, Analyst, Stephens Inc.: Got it. Okay. So it still sounds like you’re, you’re putting on loans accretive to where the average yield is, and I’m assuming there’s still some room to reprice deposits down. I guess, Jim, as we look to 4Q26 and beyond, do you feel like there’s momentum to carry the NIM above 4% as we get into 2027 and all else equal?

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Yeah, but you know, I’ll borrow the phrase, everyone says that the crystal ball gets fuzzy that far out, and we usually don’t give guidance that far out anyway. But I know we’ve talked about this before. If we look ahead in the projection, and again, it’s really funny, so I’ll hedge that again. The NIM would hover in the low fours in 2027 for the current projection. So, depends on lots of factors, and lots of things could change between here and then. By then, our macro stops will be fully off, and so we’ll reap the benefit of that. We think there’s room to drop the deposit rates a little more. We’ve been pretty thoughtful about that, watching the rates in the market that have been around us.

In 2025, that was a big issue. We thought it would be very difficult to fund the loan growth with deposit growth and drop rates at the same time, and yet we did it very successfully in 2025. So we kind of figure, we think we can continue that in 2026 as well. Set up the market as well.

Matthew Breese, Analyst, Stephens Inc.: Got it. Okay. And then last one before I’ll hop back in the queue. I feel like you laid a few breadcrumbs on the stock buyback front. At least in the very near term, the next one or two quarters, should we be penciling in, you know, $25-$30 million in buybacks per quarter?

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: ... It’s hard for me to definitively say it’ll be the next two quarters, because it is, it’s not entirely dependent on the stock price, but it is sensitive to the stock price. So if the price shoots up, we’ll slow the buyback down, and it would not all be in the first half. If the price stays where it is, or goes lower, then it, a lot of it will be in the first half. Even then, though, it may not all be in the first half. It’ll be, we intend to use the authority and be fairly aggressive with it overall, but there’s still a price sensitivity to it.

Mike McCuen, Chief Lending Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Thank you.

Jordan, Conference Operator: As a reminder, if you’d like to ask a question, press star one on your telephone keypad. Your next question comes from the line of Manuel Navas from Piper Sandler. Your line is live.

Manuel Navas, Analyst, Piper Sandler: Hey, good afternoon. On the NIM, how big of a dip are we looking at this first quarter? Did you discuss, I might have missed it, how much the NPLs benefited the NIM this quarter, like a dollar amount or a basis, or a basis point in the NIM? Just kind of quantify what’s going to come out of the NIM next quarter?

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Yeah, the NPLs were, all told, about three basis points of total impact on the NIM. It’s a little bit bigger. I just isolated the impact on that one portfolio, because we spent a lot of time looking at the variable rate portfolio in the fourth quarter to say, "Why didn’t it, the yield of that portfolio drop the way we thought it was going to drop?" And the answer is what I said before: it did drop for the effect on spread, but it was offset, I think, by these nonaccruals and a couple other factors too. But the overall effect of the total NIM for the nonaccruals coming back was about three basis points for the fourth quarter. I’m sorry, Manuel, was there another part of your question?

Manuel Navas, Analyst, Piper Sandler: And then from there, how big of a dip-

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Oh, the amount-

Manuel Navas, Analyst, Piper Sandler: are we looking at in the first quarter?

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Yeah. The amount of the dip we think is anywhere from 5-10. And I’m hedging that way because we always hedge our forecast because they’re always within 5 or 10. I think, yeah, on the model going forward, and then it drifts upward around 5 basis points a quarter. It ends up not quite 5 basis points a quarter. But it drifts upward enough to end the year around 4%.

Manuel Navas, Analyst, Piper Sandler: As those loans are sold, your loan-to-deposit ratio, ex those loans, is like in the low nineties.

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Yeah.

Manuel Navas, Analyst, Piper Sandler: You could be a little bit more aggressive on deposits, right?

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Yes and yes.

Manuel Navas, Analyst, Piper Sandler: Yeah.

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Thank you for noting that.

Manuel Navas, Analyst, Piper Sandler: Yeah.

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: It’s a big part of our thinking, actually. You know, we’re happy to see that loan-to-deposit ratio. And then these, with securities we buy, will be current rate. They won’t be underwater, so they’re perfectly available to sell for the liquidity to fund loan growth if we wanted to. Of course, we have ample borrowing capacity, so it’s not, liquidity is not an issue, but it does give us a little more liquidity, a little more dry powder to fund future loan growth, and then also not be so aggressive on the-- at the margin on deposit rates to fund the loan growth. We’re probably-

Manuel Navas, Analyst, Piper Sandler: Are there some other... Okay.

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: No, we’re probably two-thirds of our peers in terms of the deposit beta over the last year, in terms of cost of deposits. So if they’re down 33, we’re down about 22. And we’ve done that on purpose, and we’ve really, you know, probably kept them a little higher than we could because we wanted the growth, and we didn’t want the borrowings, and so we achieved both. And that’s kind of the balance. But I think there’s probably, in the long run, if rates go down more downward opportunities, but we’ll keep trying to grow the deposits. The other thing is, it also has to be a game of acquiring new accounts, non-interest bearing, new checking, and we’re trying to...

We have a sales force that, under James’ leadership and Mike’s leadership, has really delivered that for us, and we’ll continue to beat that drum.

Manuel Navas, Analyst, Piper Sandler: Are there other impacts from the sale of these loans across OpEx, you know, you’re more focused away from the Philly area? Are there other impacts in the loan loss reserve? Anything that, in those areas, that we can start to plan for now?

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: I’ll give a financially answer. The impacts on the loan loss reserve, the marks, all that was felt in the fourth quarter. That’s all reflected in the financials already.

Manuel Navas, Analyst, Piper Sandler: Okay.

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Just in terms of operational expenses, not much. We’ve already. We had a couple physical locations there we exited a while ago. So there’s no, nothing further from a facilities expense standpoint to come. But it does allow, you know, management bandwidth to refocus in other areas. And Mike McCuen, I don’t know if you want to comment on that more. That’s more of a, you know, how we run the business-

Mike McCuen, Chief Lending Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Sure

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: kind of a computer.

Mike McCuen, Chief Lending Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: No, we, I mean, Philadelphia is a great market. It’s also very greatly competitive, and we would not be. The investment to really compete the way we would like would be too great, and that money can be used in other markets for producers, physical locations, where we already have really good presence, and we want to grow those. So it’s just a trade-off we made, and I think we’ll see more profitable growth in some of those markets than we otherwise would. But nothing against Philadelphia. It’s a great market. It’s just there’s a lot of competitors there.

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Yeah. And Manuel-

Manuel Navas, Analyst, Piper Sandler: I apprec-

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Sorry.

Manuel Navas, Analyst, Piper Sandler: No, go ahead. Go ahead.

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Yeah, just from a financial effect, these were already relationships we were deciding to exit, so it was kind of a slow bleed on the loan growth. It was a net against other loan growth, so that’ll be removed now that we’ve moved them to held for sale.

Manuel Navas, Analyst, Piper Sandler: I appreciate some of the extra commentary.

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: You bet.

Jordan, Conference Operator: Your next question comes from the line of Matthew Breese from Stephens Inc. Your line is live.

Mike McCuen, Chief Lending Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Hey again. I just had one more, but want to be cognizant of everybody.

Matthew Breese, Analyst, Stephens Inc.: ... You know, the securities book has been in this kind of 350-365 range.

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Yep.

Matthew Breese, Analyst, Stephens Inc.: But yields have been down for the last couple of quarters. Jim, you had mentioned buying some, you know, at the market-type securities with the HFS portfolio. So I’m assuming that’s like a 4.75 pickup. And then, so I was hoping for, you know, maybe securities yields outlook for the first quarter and then cash flow estimates for the year. I would think at some point here, either late this year or next year, we start to see a more aggressive pickup in securities yields, but just hoping for some help there.

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Yeah. No, it’s a great point. The portfolio has a duration between 4 and 5 years. So that, right now, the philosophy is just replace the runoff. Just replace the runoff and the opportunities we get. The number I gave a moment ago when I talked about reinvestment, the reinvestment of the HFS loans upon a sale, if consolidated into securities, was assuming a repurchase rate about 4.5%. But you’re right, we just looked the other day, we see some opportunities, like, in more in the high 4s. It depends day to day, but I was using a 4.5% rate just as a rule of thumb right now. But you see some pickup, and you see some opportunities for some plain vanilla investments that are more like 4.75 right now.

So, that will naturally allow the securities portfolio to drift upward as well. It’s the position it holds in the balance sheet right now is about where we want it, and so we’re not really expanding it, we’re just replacing the runoff. Does that help?

Matthew Breese, Analyst, Stephens Inc.: Yeah. Just curious, is that, is that 4- to 5-year duration, is that good to use for 2026? I haven’t quite done the math yet on what that means for quarterly cash flows, but.

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Yeah. And I don’t...

Matthew Breese, Analyst, Stephens Inc.: It can be lumpy sometimes.

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Yes, yeah, it can be. Obviously, a lot of those are mortgage-backed securities, so a couple of years ago, rates fell, our duration’s all extended. Let me see if I have the duration of securities portfolio right now. Right now, the duration of securities portfolio is actually only 4.28, 4.28 in the fourth quarter. So there should be some repricing opportunities as that rolls, as that rolls over.

Matthew Breese, Analyst, Stephens Inc.: Okay. I’ll leave it there. Thank you very much.

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Thank you.

Jordan, Conference Operator: That concludes the question and answer session. I will now turn the call back over to Mike Price, President and CEO, for closing remarks.

Jim Reske, Chief Financial Officer, First Commonwealth Financial Corporation: Hey, thank you, as always, for your interest in our company. Great questions. I look forward to being with a number of you over the course of the next quarter, and we’re excited about the future of our company. We’re excited to grow it, maintain operating leverage, add to our fee businesses. That’s a big goal. In our regional model, really deliver good, low-cost deposit growth in each of our markets. I think our... We have enough diversity of lending businesses. I think we’re less worried about growing the loans long term than funding them with low-cost core deposits. So thank you for your time today, and stay warm.

Jordan, Conference Operator: Ladies and gentlemen, that concludes today’s call. Thank you all for joining. You may disconnect.