With a combined revenue of $21 trillion and $2.1 trillion in profits, the 2026 Fortune 500 is the definitive list of America's largest companies.

Fortune 500

Almost $20 trillion in revenue—and a record-breaking $1.87 trillion in profits. Introducing the 2025 Fortune 500, the definitive list of the biggest companies in America.

The 300 companies on this year’s list brought in over $12.6 trillion in revenue for the latest 12 months, with the median revenue figure at $22 billion.

America's Most Innovative Companies

The Fortune 500, in its 70th year in 2024, ranks the biggest U.S. companies by revenue.

The 200 companies on this list are transforming industries from the inside out.

The 300 companies on this list are transforming industries from the inside out.

The Fortune 500, in its 69th year in 2023, ranks the biggest U.S. companies by revenue.

This year’s Fortune 500 marks the 68th running of the list.

This year’s Fortune 500 marks the 67th running of the list.

Regions offers consumer and commercial banking, mortgage services, and wealth management to clients in the South, Midwest, and Texas.

This year's Fortune 500 marks the 66th running of the list.

F500-2020-446-Regions-Financial

This Alabama-based company’s subsidiary bank has about 1,400 offices and a 2,000-ATM network in the Southeast, Midwest, and Texas.

This year's Fortune 500 marks the 65th running of the list.

This year's Fortune 500 marks the 64th running of the list.

This year's Fortune 500 marks the 63rd running of the list.

This year's Fortune 500 marks the 62nd running of the list.

This year's Fortune 500 marks the 61st running of the list. Wal-Mart claims the top spot again. See who made the list.

Wal-Mart stayed on top as its sales crept closer to half-a-trillion dollars. Apple moved into the top five. And UnitedHealth Group continued its steady climb. 

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Regions Financial Corporation is one of the largest full-service providers of consumer and commercial banking, wealth management, and mortgage products and services in the United States. Founded in 1971 after the merger of three Alabama banks, the company is a member of the S&P 500 Index and serves as one of the largest banks in America. Regions operates through three segments to offer clients and organizations in the South, the Midwest, and Texas banking services and wealth management.

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Regions Financial (RF): Company Profile, Stock Price, News, Rankings

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Regions Financial

regions financial

Good morning, and welcome to the Regions Financial Corporation's Quarterly Earnings Call. My name is Kris, and I'll be your operator for today's call. I would like to remind everyone that all participant phone lines have been placed on listen only. At the end of the call, there will be a question and answer session. I question will now turn the call over to Dana Nolan to begin.

Thank you, Chris. Welcome to Regent's second quarter earnings call. John and David will provide high level commentary regarding our results. Earnings documents, which include our forward looking statement disclaimer and non GAAP reconciliations are available in the Investor Relations section of our website. These disclosures cover our presentation materials, today's prepared remarks and Q and A. I will now turn the call over to John.

Thank you, Dana, and good morning, everyone. We appreciate you joining our call today. Earlier this morning, we reported strong quarterly earnings of $534,000,000 resulting in earnings per share of $0.59 On an adjusted basis, earnings were $538,000,000 or $0.60 per share. We delivered pretax pre provision income of $832,000,000 a 14% increase year over year, and we generated a return on tangible common equity of 19%. We are very proud of our second quarter performance as we continue to reap the benefits of the investments we've made across our businesses and the successful execution of our strategic plans.

We continue to grow average deposits during the second quarter and are growing accounts across consumer checking, small business and wealth management. In fact, we grew consumer deposits across every one of our eight priority markets. Our focus on growing consumer checking accounts and the core operating accounts of a business has driven more than 30% organic growth in total average deposits over the last five years, among the most in our peer set. While average loans remained stable during the quarter, we grew ending loans in both the consumer and corporate bank. Corporate client sentiment has improved since the April.

And notably, consistent with the execution of our strategic plans, we've added over 300 new commercial relationships across our wholesale business year to date. Pipelines within our small and middle market businesses in particular continue to grow. Our consumers also remain healthy. Debit and credit spend continue to increase modestly versus the prior year. During the quarter, we generated modest growth in average consumer credit card and home equity lines of credit balances.

Importantly, consumer credit quality remains strong. Asset quality metrics are improving and payment rates on our consumer credit card remain above pre pandemic levels. We also had a lot of success growing and diversifying our fee revenue. Treasury management revenue is up 8% year to date, while the total number of clients served has increased 10%. We see continued opportunity to grow clients within our existing customer base, especially as we focus on our priority markets and further expansion of our treasury management services into the small business sector. Wealth management continues to be a good story for us, generating another quarter of record fee income, while representing a steady source of revenue attributable to both strong client acquisition and good revenue diversification. Since 2018, wealth management revenue has grown at more than an 8% compounded annual growth rate. Further, Regions was recently recognized in Global Private Bankers 2025 Innovation Awards as the best trust services by a private bank and best wealth planning execution.

Since 2019, capital markets revenue has grown to 14% compounded annual growth rate, driven by a combination of organic activities and strategic acquisitions. We continue to make progress on investments to modernize our core technology platforms. We've begun rolling out a new native mobile app in just the past few weeks, and we're planning to upgrade our commercial loan system to a new cloud platform in the coming months. We plan to begin running pilots on our new cloud based deposit system beginning in late twenty twenty six, with full conversion anticipated in 2027. Once completed, we expect to be one of the first regional banks in the country on a truly modern core platform.

So as you can see, we continue to focus on growth across our businesses as evidenced by our overall financial performance. Our dedication to driving shareholder value has resulted in the highest returns on tangible common equity over the last four years compared to our peer group, and we're on track to make it a fifth year in a row. We have also delivered top quartile EPS growth over the last five and ten year periods. And importantly, over the last six years, we've increased our dividend at a 10 plus percent compounded annual growth rate, the highest among our peers. We announced another 6% increase in the common dividend earlier this week.

And notably, over the last ten years, we have bought back more stock on a relative basis than any of our peers. All of this has contributed to top quartile total shareholder returns over the last three, five and ten years. Finally, we think the ability to grow tangible book value plus dividends should be closely correlated to stock price. We've delivered top quartile performance on this metric over the last three and five year periods. In conclusion, we're very proud of our second quarter results.

Our strong performance is attributable to our 20,000 plus associates and their commitment to keep our customers at the center of everything we do and their focus on executing our plan. As a result, we expect this momentum to carry into the 2025 and beyond, providing a real opportunity to continue to grow and deliver the same kind of results that we've delivered in recent years. With that, I'll hand it over to David to provide some highlights regarding the quarter.

Thank you, John. Let's start with the balance sheet. Ending loans grew 1%, while average loans remained stable. Growth in ending business loans was driven by C and I and, to a lesser extent, real estate. Specifically, within C and I, growth was driven primarily within structured products and manufacturing.

Within real estate, growth primarily resulted from previously approved multifamily projects continuing to fund up. Overall, pipelines are up 17% over last year and line commitments are up 1%. So we believe we are well positioned as the macro backdrop improves. Average and ending consumer loans remained relatively stable as growth in average credit card and home equity was offset by modest declines in other categories. We now expect full year 2025 average loans to be stable to up modestly versus 2024.

Building upon John's remarks on our multiyear successes with respect to deposits, we continue to observe positive trends in both core and priority markets. Targeted acquisition strategies have had good traction in the second quarter, reflecting positive consumer growth in every priority market. In fact, overall consumer deposits and priority markets grew 20% more than core markets during the quarter. Additionally, 60% of the consumer deposit dollars resulting from our most recent money market campaign were in priority markets and 85% of the campaign dollars represented new money. In the Corporate Banking Group, relationship management and new customer focus has led to average quarterly balance growth of more than 2%.

The Corporate Banking Group has traction in priority markets as well with momentum there helping the overall growth picture. Average deposit balances grew over 1% sequentially, while ending balances remained relatively stable. Interest bearing deposit costs continued to decline as expected to 1.39% despite higher marginal acquisition costs. Additionally, our non interest bearing proportion remains in the low 30% range, reflective of our strong operating deposit base. Looking forward, we now expect full year average balances to be up modestly versus the prior year.

Let's shift to net interest income. Net interest income rebounded, increasing by 5% linked quarter. As expected, the negative impacts from day count and other nonrecurring items in the first quarter did not repeat. In addition to some modest nonrecurring positive items during the second quarter, deposit pricing performance and the benefit from fixed rate asset turnover exceeded our initial estimates and are expected to continue to support net interest income going forward. Although Fed funds remained stable in the quarter, we were able to manage deposit costs lower while also supporting growth initiatives.

The ability to grow deposits while achieving our mid-30s falling rate beta target and best in class funding costs further exemplifies Regions' funding advantage. During the quarter, approximately $3,000,000,000 of new fixed rate loan and securities production was added at approximately 140 basis points above the yield on maturing and amortizing balances, With approximately 50% of the runoff coming from longer duration mortgage collateral, we expect these tailwinds to persist for multiple years, assuming middle and long term rates remain near current levels. Next, we took advantage of spread levels in April by adding $1,000,000,000 of agency mortgage backed securities. The securities will serve to store liquidity, insulate rate exposure and optimize returns and can easily be deployed back into loans in the future as necessary. The higher interest rate environment supports balance sheet repricing dynamics.

Net interest income is expected to be stable to modestly higher in the third quarter as the benefits from fixed rate asset turnover and one additional day are offset by fewer nonrecurring positives and higher hedging notional amounts. We now expect full year 2025 net interest income to grow between 35%. Finally, assuming market forward interest rates, the net interest margin is expected to remain in the low to mid 360s for the remainder of the year with the ability to resume its upward trajectory as we move into 2026. Now let's take a look at fee revenue performance during the quarter. Adjusted noninterest income increased 5% linked quarter, driven primarily by growth in mortgage, seasonally elevated card and ATM fees and another record quarter in wealth management income.

Additionally, market value adjustments on HR assets increased $19,000,000 during the quarter. These market value adjustments are offset primarily in salaries and benefits expense. Mortgage income increased 20% linked quarter, driven primarily by $13,000,000 net favorable adjustment associated with changes to the company's MSR valuation model assumptions. Capital markets income, excluding CVA, increased 5% compared to the prior quarter, driven by elevated M and A advisory and real estate capital markets activity. With respect to the third quarter, we currently expect a modest increase in the $85,000,000 to $95,000,000 range for capital markets income.

Service charges decreased 6% during the quarter, driven primarily by seasonal decline in treasury management income. With respect to the full year 2025, we now expect adjusted income to grow between 2.53.5% versus 2024. Let's move on to noninterest expense. Adjusted noninterest expense increased 4% compared to the prior quarter, driven primarily by an expected 5% increase in salaries and benefits, which included one additional workday, the impact of a full quarter of merit, higher revenue based incentives and the offset to increased HR asset valuations. Full time equivalent headcount also increased during the quarter by just over 100 associates.

We now expect full year 2025 adjusted noninterest expense to be up 1% to 2%, and we anticipate generating full year positive operating leverage in the one hundred and fifty two fifty basis point range. Regarding asset quality, provision expense was $13,000,000 over net charge offs during the quarter. The increase in the allowance was driven primarily by loan growth with some offset from improving underlying credit metrics. The resulting allowance for credit loss ratio declined one basis point to 1.8%. Annualized net charge offs as a percentage of average loans decreased five basis points to 47 basis points.

Nonperforming loans as a percent of total loans improved eight basis points to 80 basis points. Business services criticized loans improved by 6% and total delinquencies also improved. Our through the cycle net charge off expectations are unchanged and remain between forty and fifty basis points. Continue to expect full year net charge offs to be towards the higher end of the range attributable primarily to loans within our previously identified portfolios of interest. We expect third quarter losses to be generally in line with the second quarter and then decline in the fourth quarter.

Importantly, we have reserve for remaining anticipated losses associated with these portfolios. Let's turn to capital and liquidity. We ended the quarter with an estimated common equity Tier one ratio of 10.7%, while executing 144,000,000 in share repurchases and paying $224,000,000 in common dividends during the quarter. When adjusted to include AOCI, common equity Tier one increased from 9.1% to an estimated 9.2% from the first to the second quarter, attributable to strong capital generation and a reduction in long term interest rates. In the near term, we continue to manage common equity Tier one inclusive of AOCI closer to the lower end of our 9.25% to 9.75% operating range.

This should provide meaningful capital flexibility to meet proposed and evolving regulatory changes while supporting strategic growth objectives and allowing us to continue to increase the dividend and repurchase shares commensurate with earnings. As John indicated, we are really pleased with our quarterly performance, particularly given uncertain market dynamics, and we believe we are well positioned regardless of market conditions. This covers our prepared remarks. We will now move to the Q and A portion of the call.

Thank you. We will now be conducting a question and answer session. Thank you. Our first question comes from the line of Ebrahim Poonawala with Bank of America. Please proceed with your question.

Just maybe just first big picture. All if you can talk to the tax what implication does that have in, maybe tie in, like, this customer sentiment maybe. But what is the implications of the tax bill, the bonus depreciation? What does all of that mean as you think about loan growth and spending from your customers? And then on the other side, at from a consumer standpoint, that and we have the tax breaks and note taxes and tips, etcetera.

Is is that is any of that meaningful in terms of shoring up, some of the consumers for the balance sheet at the lower income level? Thanks.

Yeah. So maybe I'll talk about sentiment first, Ebrahim. I think amongst our wholesale bank, our business customers, continue to see some improvement in sentiment. I would say, in general, sentiment hasn't changed much since we were last together ninety days ago. The passage of the big beautiful bill and tax package does create some certainty, which is quite helpful, I think, to businesses and to consumers.

On the consumer side, our customers are still in very good shape. They maintain good liquidity, much like our business customers do. They're managing their debt levels well. We're not seeing any real deterioration at all. I do think consumers are spending a little less, being a little more careful, particularly on luxury items and things of that nature, just because of some volatility and uncertainty.

But all in all, businesses and consumers are in a pretty good place. There remains some, I think, uncertainty about the path of interest rates and generally whether or not we're going to experience any increase in prices. There's more clarity around tariffs. It does appear that the administration's focus is on fair trade, I would say. So most businesses have had now a couple of months to think through the impact on their business, on their supply chains and other things.

And so I think they are gaining confidence. With respect to your particular question about the tax package, bonus depreciation is has historically been very helpful, and we believe it will be again. In talking to customers who sell, as an example, heavy equipment, construction related equipment, there has been a real uptick in inquiries, and we expect there will be an uptick in activity with respect to that category. And I think consumers just appreciate the clarity and the confirmation that the tax package and the 2017 tax package will be extended. And so they know what to expect.

So all those things, I think, portend for positive momentum in the 2025 and in 2026.

Got it. And I guess maybe just as a follow-up, we obviously are seeing some pickup in bank M and A activity. The regulatory window seems to be opening seems to be open. Now both, you and David have know all the good, bad, and the ugly of bank m and a. So give us a sense of your perspective.

Like, you have a decent stock currency, done a good job in terms of where the franchise is today. Like, how should we think about the inorganic growth? How you would think about and assess bank deals? Thanks.

Yeah. Our, you know, our point of view on this I think we've been very consistent that we're not interested in depository M and A. We think we have a really good plan. We continue to execute the plan.

We're able to deliver top quartile results. M and A is disruptive. It's challenging. It takes your focus off what you're doing every day. And we think we have a plan and a path to continue to deliver top quartile results for our shareholders.

And as a consequence, we're not today interested in bank M and A. We also have a substantial technology project underway. We've talked about to modernize our core deposit platform and our commercial loan system. That's the other area of focus for us. And once we get that complete and, have what will be, we think, the most contemporary cloud based core platform amongst our peers, then we can reassess where we are.

But in the meantime, we're just going to keep doing what we do. We'll look for some nonbank opportunities. Those have been good to us. We haven't seen anything recently that has interest us, but we will continue to look.

Our next question comes from the line of Scott Siefers with Piper Sandler. Please proceed with your question.

Thank you for taking the question. David, I was hoping maybe with regard to the margin, if you could spend a little more time unpacking exactly where things are coming in better than you had expected. I know you touched on fixed asset turnover in your prepared remarks, but it is given I think you'd sort of previously teased the possibility of getting to three sixty sooner than the end of the year, but now it's both higher and sooner. So just curious how things are playing out from your perspective.

Sure. Just to level set, you know, we had talked about getting to three sixty. We changed our guidance to get there a little sooner than the end of the year. We did have a nice growth in in the margin this quarter. But let me let me give you a couple of things, that aren't going to repeat.

We did we had some notional hedge notional that matured at the beginning of the quarter that had been serving as an as a negative to NII and margin, that went away. And so that that helped us at all that $56,000,000. We'll have new notional going on in the third quarter that'll replace that. And just to remind everybody, we put these swaps on three years in advance. So, the timing isn't exactly perfect.

So that's 5,000,000 or $6,000,000. It won't repeat. And then we had a little bit more recoveries on some credit that we received. Normally, that number is about $5,000,000 a quarter. It was about $10,000,000 this quarter, so we had 5,000,000 extra there.

So call it $10,000,000 or three basis points that won't repeat. So you got to take your 3.65% margin and really start at 3.62%. As we think about, next quarter this past quarter and next quarter is we really, had the front book, back book, we told you, 140 basis points of pickup. But we've also been controlling our deposit cost. We had a pretty big CD maturity month in the month of May.

So this quarter. We don't have that type of change in the third quarter, but we do in the fourth quarter. So the third quarter is going to be a little bit more muted growth. We had nice loan growth at the end of the quarter, continuing to control our cost. And the front bookback book will continue at about the same level this quarter.

As I've said in the prepared comments, that front bookback book lasts for about three years, albeit diminishing over time, But it's a nice tailwind for us. And with the recent loan growth, that gives us pretty good confidence of having growth in the third quarter and beyond.

Okay. Thanks. And then, actually, David, while I've got you, can you sort of discuss kind of the tail of deposit cost leverage from here? I always think of regions as having a little bit of a longer trend, given the retail focus. How are you thinking about overall deposit pricing from here?

Yes. So, first off, as you noted, we had, our deposit our interest bearing deposit cost came down, and we continue to grow deposits. We grew all the deposits in all of our priority markets, which are eight of them. So we're very excited about that. In terms of our beta, as you recall, on the up cycle, we had the lowest beta at about 43%.

We said for kind of guidance purposes, we're using the mid-30s. So we're at 35% as a cumulative beta thus far. We expect over time to get back to that 43%, but just for planning purposes in that mid thirties, we think is important. And our focus on continuing to grow checking accounts and operating accounts of businesses helps us have and sustain a pretty high level of noninterest bearing deposits, which is a little over 30%. So I think that, we have the ability to get that beta, that 35% down or up even more as the Fed, starts its cutting cycle, which we can debate when that would be.

We don't we don't see a cut in July, but, maybe there's a cut, later on in the year.

Our next question comes from the line of John Pancari with Evercore ISI. Please proceed with your question.

Good morning. Good morning. Just wanted to see if you could kind of walk through the loan growth dynamics a little bit more. What's in your underneath that stable to up guidance?

What are you seeing in terms of line utilization trends? And what are the biggest drivers on the commercial side from here in terms of either your markets or the or product areas? And then I guess similarly on the consumer side, where do you see the greatest drivers to asset growth?

John, so we've had I think, particularly over the last couple of quarters, we've seen a nice uptick in our pipelines. They're improving. Pipelines are up 17% year over year and 30% over the first quarter. That's in our wholesale business in the Corporate Bank. Production is up 19% versus the quarter and 15% year over year.

So and we're about half of that funded. So we're seeing some good growth as we benefit from just our day to day blocking and tackling, and we benefit from the good markets we're in and some improving sentiment, I would say. We're experiencing growth in our energy portfolio and asset based lending and some in the manufacturing sector within our structured finance portfolio. Also all areas where we're seeing some nice growth, our REIT business. And we have previously committed to some multifamily projects that are continuing to fund up, which is a catalyst for growth.

All that's offset by our continued discipline to remix our portfolio. So we've exited, over the last twelve months, almost $1,000,000,000 in leveraged lending, enterprise value lending relationships, much of which was in the technology portfolio that we just felt it was appropriate to exit. We weren't getting the returns on that risk that we thought we should. And that's, again, I think, a discipline that we've developed now over a number of years. And so that offsets some of the growth that we're experiencing, which is not why we're not projecting a lot.

But we're seeing good activity amongst particularly our commercial middle market customers. Pipelines are also improving in our larger corporate business, and real estate has been stable. So all that is positive. On the consumer side, again, we've seen some improvement in home equity lending activity, and we expect customers continue to borrow there. We're continuing to hire mortgage bankers.

We believe in that business. And while it's a little challenged today, there are some green shoots, we think, and we'd expect to see some positive activity there. And then our Home Improvement Finance business is also one that we have a lot of optimism for over the longer term. With respect to consumer credit card, it's growing a bit, and that's an important relationship oriented business with us. All of our credit card customers also have other products with regions, and that's growing nicely.

Okay. John, thank you for that. I appreciate it. And just secondly, it probably sounds like a broken record asking this on the various calls. But on particularly in the Southeast, I think it's relevant.

But on competition and the competitive backdrop, certainly, a heavy focus around the Southeast markets, hearing some pretty clear commentary around a step up in both loan pricing competition as well as on the deposit side. Your yields are still pretty good this quarter, both on the loan side and on the deposit pricing cost. So what are you seeing on competitive dynamics? And are there considerations you're making whether you participate where you do see that intensification happening around the on the loan pricing side or deposit?

Well, we yes, I mean, to your point, we are experiencing competition. We're in great markets. And so we have to expect that other banks and non banks, frankly, are going to continue to want to compete in the markets that we serve. As I've said a number of times, we've been in a lot of these markets for over one hundred and seventy years. We have a strong brand, a real strong reputation.

We're building our business around people. We take advantage of the great places that we're in. We think our teams partner well together, focus on delivering great products and services to customers. And so it's really about how we execute every day, how we execute our plans and recognize that it is a competitive environment. There are going to be people coming into our markets every day.

We want to take our customers. We want to make sure that we're protecting the relationships we have and at the same time calling on new prospects to establish broader relationships. And in fact, in our within our commercial banking business, we've already grown relationships this year that equate to about 5% growth in total relationships on an annualized basis. So we are not only protecting the business we have, but we're continuing to grow in markets that are important to us.

Our next question comes from the line of Ken Usdin with Autonomous Research. Please proceed with your question.

Good morning. Hi, good morning. John, I wanted to follow-up on your one of your prepared remarks where you talked about, like, now that we're got that line of sight on the system is being, you know, closer to being done. Just wondering what we should be thinking about in terms of when we get to that moment. Do we start to see just an incremental amount of efficiency that come out of the system?

Does it free up some legacy costs when we get there? And also, does it change anything in your mind about like the strategic push forward for regions?

Yes. Maybe I'll let David talk about the efficiency and cost part of this. But I do think it positions us really well with respect to our strategy. We believe just if nothing else, we have the benefit of continuing to offer more products, more services to our customers and to do it more quickly, more efficiently. And so we think, because we'll have a single deposit platform operating across our footprint, It will be cloud based and contemporary in form that we really will have a competitive advantage with respect to technology and our ability to bring products and services to our customers and to our bankers much more efficiently and effectively.

And that then might change some of the aspects of our strategy. But today, we're focused on just delivering that project.

I think from an efficiency standpoint, that really is both sides of the equation. John mentioned the revenue efficiencies, getting to market quicker, being able to have an offer in one area versus another area based on the dynamics of a given market. From a total cost standpoint, we do expect over time that technology costs will increase. Software as a service, just broad based, is going to cause that across the industry, we would believe. And so the issue is as we leverage that technology, including artificial intelligence and generative AI, is how can we use those tools.

And over time, we will have, attrition in our workforce that will, that we won't have to replace because we have technology that can do a particular job. So, I think that, the key is how does all that happen in tandem? And we don't we don't have that clear answer just yet. But in theory, that's that's what the expectation should be with this new technologies that we're gonna be, implementing. And it includes a commercial loan system and deposit system and a new general ledger.

So there's a lot going on there over the next couple two, three years, actually.

Got it. And and as a follow-up to what you've been building, you just mentioned the commercial system. Like, how how run rated are the bankers that you've hired, you know, so far, in terms of their production production potential? And how are you doing in terms of your pacing in terms of the competitive ability to add more people like you've talked about over the last few years looking at like upwards of 150 plus over the next couple of years?

Yes. I think we're on track. We should have hired about half of the bankers that we expect to hire by the end of the third quarter. Begin building around support staff first because we want to make sure we have the teams in place to support our bankers when they join our teams. I think our recruiting has been good.

We talk often about the importance of recruiting every day, expect our leaders to know who the best bankers are in the markets that they're operating in. And as a result, we should have a leg up on recruiting because we're actively doing that all the time. And, we're pretty confident in our ability to complete our recruiting of the bankers we anticipate hiring. As I say, about half of them by the end of the third quarter, which is on pace with our expectations and the balance midway through 2026 probably.

Our next question comes from the line of Steven Alexopoulos with TD Cowen. Please proceed with your question.

Towards the start, so the short interest is fairly high in your stock. And part of the thesis on those more negative is that it's going be tough for you to maintain this high mix of non interest bearing, right?

And tied to that, your net interest margin might be at a peak. Now in the slides, do say you expect to hold the non interest bearing mix stable. Could you unpack this for us? How do you expect to maintain that stable means you have to grow it if you're growing total deposits of fund loan growth? And then, ultimately, that'll lead to what environment do we need to see for you to see NIM expansion beyond the second half?

Yeah. So a couple things there. In our whole business model is predicated on when we think of a customer, we think of a checking account of a consumer and an operating account of a business, non interest bearing deposits. From that, we can leverage all the other products and services that those customers need and value. And so when we're growing, you know, if we wanna have a a money market, especially in one of our our growth markets, we're gonna bring and expect a checking account to come with that.

So continuing to grow new clients, John had mentioned 300 new clients, so, operating accounts. That, we think we can continue to maintain that low 30% non interest bearing, deposit account. I mean, again, a lot of those two thirds of those are consumer checking accounts with $5,000 on average in them. Those aren't going anywhere. And if you're in markets and making investments where there's a lot of growth in people and businesses, we should expect as we grow total deposits that we can continue to grow non interest bearing.

Relative to the margin, we had talked about trying to get our margin, more stable, and less volatile. And we've said we could be, depending on where the interest rate environment is, somewhere between 3.54%. And we still believe that. So I think that at the end of the day, we have some more room to grow, the margin. And it really depends on what absolute rates are, but also the shape of the yield curve.

And so if we can have a normal yield curve, you call it, in the 4% range, maybe a tad over that on the 103% on the short end, that's a pretty good environment for us to continue to grow net interest income and the resulting margin.

Yes. And I would just add, if I can, we have almost 4,500,000 consumer checking account customers. Average balance, as David suggested, is about $5,500 So we have a very loyal, low cost and granular, importantly, customer base who are actively using their accounts for, thirty nine or forty quarters. Visa recognizes the bank whose debit card base is most utilizes their cards and is most active. And we've been at the top of that group, which means our customers are actually operating out of their accounts, and we believe that that will continue.

We have 400,000 small business customers. They have an average balance of about $15,000 So again, really core granular customers, and we're growing consumer checking accounts. We're growing small business checking accounts in the markets that we're in, and we believe that we can continue to do that. The final thing is amongst our core commercial customer base, we have about a 6465% penetration rate for treasury management products and services. So there's some upside there as we continue to broaden and deepen relationships, which should solidify and help us grow non interest bearing deposits.

Got it. That's helpful. For a follow-up question, which goes back to your answer to John Pancari's question. When we listen to other banks, if you heard the PNC call, as an example, they talk about good loan growth coming from your markets and its share gain. So there's also a view that Regions is a bit on defense with all these other banks coming into your market.

Can you just give us a sense? We think about whatever loan growth is for the industry, do you guys have an expectation that you'll be at that level or better, which is partially has to do with appetite to grow? Thanks.

Yes. I mean, we have and I think I've tried to make the point just a few minutes ago, we have, over the last seven, eight years, been really focused on capital allocation, risk adjusted returns. We've been remixing our portfolio, and that's a real disciplined process we continue to go through. It's not been so much about growth for us as it has been to position our portfolio for soundness, for profitability and then ultimately for growth. There will be periods of time when we just don't grow.

Regions Financial (RF) Q2 2025 Earnings Call Transcript

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