Fifth Third Bancorp (FITB) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary
December 8, 2021
Earnings Call Speaker Segments
Ryan Nash
analystFifth Third joining us. Fifth Third navigated the pandemic better than most, built lots of liquidity, cut costs and added significant reserves. More recently, it's pivoted back towards growth, particularly in its commercial business and generating strong fee income. While doing this, it's continued to invest heavily in its industry-leading technology as it looks to gain scale. This has resulted in being one of the few banks to generate positive operating leverage in a really challenging backdrop. Here to tell us more about the momentum is President, Tim Spence. Also joining us on stage is Chief Financial Officer, Jamie Leonard. Tim is going to walk us through some slides, and then we'll have a Q&A.
Timothy Spence
executiveOkay. Thanks, Ryan. I think we're done. I think we're good.
Ryan Nash
analystThe slides are out for anyone who has any questions.
Timothy Spence
executiveThat's right. No, good morning to all of you here and on the webcast. As Ryan mentioned, I'm joined this morning by Jamie Leonard, our CFO, and we are looking forward to discussing Fifth Third's strategic priorities with you. I will start on Slide 3 of our presentation. As both Greg Carmichael and I have said in the past, at Fifth Third, everything starts with living our purpose, to improve the lives of our customers and the well-being of our communities. As our actions demonstrate, we are committed to generating sustainable value for all of our stakeholders. Most recently, in September, we launched an innovative $180 million Neighborhood Investment Program aimed at accelerating economic and social revitalization in 9 majority Black communities across our footprint. In late October, we issued our inaugural green bond, becoming the first category bank to issue a sustainable bond. And 2 weeks ago, we made a special payment of up to $1,250 to over 7,000 of our frontline employees to signal our gratitude for their tireless work and support for our customers throughout the pandemic. Our ESG actions continue to receive high recognition from prominent data providers. Our rating from MSCI, a leading ESG data provider, recently received a 3-notch upgrade to A. As shown in our materials, our ratings across other leading data providers are tops among our peers. Additionally, I'm very proud of the third-party recognition that Greg recently received, becoming the first CEO of a U.S. bank to be named Responsible CEO of the Year by 3BL Media. This award recognizes his bold and innovative leadership in delivering on our ESG commitments. We have also consistently delivered on our financial commitments. Five years ago, we articulated 4 key strategic priorities aimed at delivering strong and consistent results through the cycle. Slide 4 highlights some of the key proof points and outcomes from our commitments. Whether it is our sustained peer-leading household growth, our top quartile key credit metrics, our positioning of the balance sheet, our strong and diversified fee revenues our expense discipline -- or our expense discipline, we have established a track record for doing what we say we are going to do and following through on our commitments. What this execution ultimately produces is superior, consistent, sustainable financial performance. Our core ROTCE, excluding unrealized gains and the impact of reserve releases, was nearly 16% over the course of the last year, with an ROA above 1.1%. And given our reserve coverage and capital levels, our loss absorbency is top quartile among our peers, combined with the second lowest NPL ratio. Our 4 priorities remain relevant in the current environment and I'm excited about the continued opportunities that are in front of us. Turning to Slide 5. We continue to provide you with holistic longitudinal data to demonstrate that we are gaining consumer market share throughout our footprint. This will support differentiated growth rates and financial performance going forward. While it is possible to generate short-term household growth in any one geography or in any one quarter through the use of marketing, our household growth rates have run 4 to 5x the overall population growth for several years now. We are generating growth in every market where we compete. Growth in our Chicago and Southeast markets has been particularly strong, and we continue to strengthen our position in our Midwest markets. It's important to stress that our focus is on primary banking relationships, the accounts that our customers use to get paid, pay bills, to shop and to save. This shows up in our debit card volumes, where Fifth Third is ranked eighth in total spend among all U.S. banks and was the fastest-growing large bank in 2020. During the same period, we ranked ninth in ACH credit received transactions, which measure direct deposits, and we're the third fastest-growing large bank in this category. Our success in generating outsized household growth comes down to 3 factors. First, leveraging smart scale in both branch presence and brand density in our local markets, punctuated by the impact of the MB merger and our next-gen de novo branch strategy in the Southeast. Second, offering differentiated products and services like Momentum Banking, which I will touch on in more detail on the next slide. And third, delivering an outstanding customer experience, as shown by leading third-party surveys where we have improved from the bottom quartile 5 years ago to top quartile today, and where we were recognized as the #1 bank for taking care of our customers during the COVID-19 pandemic. Now turning to Slide 6. This past summer, we launched Fifth Third Momentum Banking, our flagship mass-market offering. Momentum is unparalleled in the industry, combining the best of innovative fintech product functionality with the strength of access and human touch of a traditional bank. Momentum offers the broadest array of solutions to get access to your money, including free access to your paycheck, social security income and other recurring ACH payments up to 2 days early through Early Pay, like you would see with Chime. Free overdraft protection that automatically transfers funds from other accounts to cover a negative balance. And Extra Time to cure overdrafts that do occur until midnight the following business day. On-demand short-term advances through MyAdvance to help out in a pinch, like you would see with Dave. Immediate access to funds from digital check deposits, like you would see from PayPal and Venmo. And algorithmic Smart Savings to help you build up a nest egg, like you would see with Acorns or Digit. Momentum's value proposition is appealing to an attractive demographic. Nearly 3/4 of new momentum customers are professionals in their prime working and asset accumulation years with a median age of 36. New customers with Momentum accounts also have higher primacy rates with better digital adoption than our legacy offerings and solid average balances, which bodes well for retention. This presents an opportunity to deepen relationships with lending, payments and other value-added products and services. We believe Momentum is a distinct area of strength and differentiation for Fifth Third and expect it to generate continued household growth and relationship revenue in the future. Now turning to Slide 7. Our commitment to providing value-added client solutions is evident in our growing and well-diversified fee revenues, which now make up more than 40% of total revenue. Our total fee mix has remained above the peer median for the past 5 years. And over that time, we have generated strong fee growth across most captions, with particular success in Commercial Banking, Treasury Management and Wealth & Asset Management. We will continue to look to acquire fee-generating capabilities where it complements our key industry verticals, including adding to our capital markets and TM capabilities and also in our wealth business. Slide 8 highlights the composition of our deposit fee revenue. Consumer deposit fee revenues, such as overdrafts, have become a focal point in the industry. But Fifth Third has been deliberately reducing its reliance on these fees for the past several years. As a result, we have the lowest concentration of overdrafts as a percentage of deposit fees among peers who have significant consumer banking operations. Momentum Banking furthers those efforts given the range of liquidity solutions that it includes, and we also recently enacted several additional policy changes to further reduce overdraft fees. Additionally, we have been investing in several years to provide digitally enabled commercial payment solutions, particularly through payments process automation services like Expert AP, Expert AR and our currency processing solutions. Demand has accelerated during the pandemic as treasurers and CFOs at our clients' firms face the increasing need to move money more quickly and to automate back office functions. These are tip-of-the-spear offerings for us, driving new quality relationships to the bank and producing peer-leading growth and revenue contribution. Slide 9 highlights our industry vertical strategy and our commercial franchise. Dating back to the launch of our health care vertical in 2008, we've invested in talent, technology and the full complement of banking, capital markets and payment services to provide clients with industry-specific expertise, insights and solutions. These investments have enabled us to generate strong financial returns with consistent and disciplined risk management. Slide 10 highlights the strong C&I commitment growth that we have generated since the start of this year, driven by a record year for new quality relationships and from existing clients who are increasing lines in anticipation of future growth. This presents a significant incremental loan balance growth opportunity as utilization rates recover. As shown on the slide, middle market revolver utilization rates have begun to tick up in the second half of 2021. While it is difficult to predict when we will see partial normalization in revolver utilization rates, we do know that the production we have generated, the pipelines we see throughout our geographies and verticals and the benefit of the Provide acquisition all point to a robust lending environment for Fifth Third and 2022. Turning to Slide 11. Assuming Omicron and other variants don't stall the recovery, we are optimistic about future loan growth as we head into next year. We're also quite bullish on the significant earnings power we have in a rising rate environment given our balance sheet management and excess liquidity position. As many of you know, Fifth Third has been one of the few large-cap banks to remain disciplined with the excess cash generated throughout the pandemic. We have been able to remain patient largely due to the structural NII protection provided by our securities and hedge portfolios, while many other banks were forced to invest at some of the worst entry points in history. Given the market is already pricing in a couple of rate hikes in 2022, we thought it would be helpful to provide a sensitivity table showing possible growth in our securities portfolio against different deposit betas for the first 100 basis points of rate hikes. Assuming we add $10 billion in securities at a 2% yield with a 5% to 10% deposit beta on the first 100 basis points of hikes, we would expect to generate approximately $875 million to $925 million in additional net interest income the following year against a static rate scenario. This hopefully highlights the asset sensitivity of the bank, which may not be apparent when comparing different [ ALCO ] assumptions and disclosures across our peers. In summary, Fifth Third is a different bank today than the Fifth Third of a decade ago. We have delivered on our commitments and remain focused to generating long-term through-the-cycle outperformance. We've significantly improved our franchise and our financial performance and we'll sustain the management discipline and commitment to customer-focused investments in our markets, products and platforms. We are committed to generating sustainable value for our stakeholders, and we'll deploy capital to maximize long-term profitability. With that, Jamie and I are happy to take your questions. Thank you.
Ryan Nash
analystGreat. And thank you, Tim, for the prepared remarks. So I wanted to hit on a host of different topics, but maybe we could just start off strategically. And when I think about it, you've had -- you've done a tremendous job executing on the strategy that you've laid out over the past few years. And I'm curious, as you look ahead, what is the focus for the bank over the next few years?
Timothy Spence
executiveYes. It's a good question, Ryan. I think as I mentioned in my prepared remarks, if there were one word that we wanted to leave the audience with today, it would be consistency, okay? It would be a belief that consistent execution, consistency in strategic focus and consistency with regard to the way that we manage the bank from a risk return perspective are important. Those are going to continue to be hallmarks of our execution. So if you think about the next handful of years, we intend to remain disciplined as it relates to risk management, as it relates to the focus on profitability that characterize what we got done through Project North Star. I think we also expect to have an environment where we can generate pretty attractive growth, right? That's both because of this sustained outperformance in household growth, it's evidenced in the new quality relationships we've generated in the last year in the commercial business and the growth in commitments. That, coupled with the positioning of the balance sheet, should create an environment that's favorable from a revenue growth perspective for Fifth Third, and you should expect us to continue to lean in, in those areas. And then last but certainly not least, it's going to be the continuation of the strategy to modernize the bank, both as it relates to the tech platforms and the quality of the products and services.
Ryan Nash
analystMaybe Tim we'll -- I'll pick up where you just left off there before we get into some of the fundamentals. You were, I think, Tech Banker of the Year a few years ago, your CEO comes from a technology background. Can you maybe just talk a little bit about the tech strategy. I know you're modernizing some of the core systems at the moment. But how do you feel you're differentiating your tech strategy from some of the others in the industry?
Timothy Spence
executiveYes, sure. And so we think about technology as having 3 layers. There's an infrastructure layer. You can think about the point of focus there being resiliency and the ability to perform in an always-on digital environment. right? There's been a lot of focus, I know we have talked about this, but the investments we've made to build the right level of redundancy, to be able to run hot-hot, to move data into a cloud environment and otherwise, right? So there's been a lot of investment focus in the last 3, 4 years in that particular layer of the stack. The second layer then are the platforms, right? And as is true for every bank in our industry, a lot of the core platforms that we have been running the business on are legacy mainframe platforms. It's important for us to systematically move those platforms off of mainframes and out into the cloud. And the focus there is really around automation, which drives efficiency and quality, as well as to improve our own development speeds, right? The last but I think, ultimately, the most important layer is the way that we think about products and embedding technology and the quality of the product offerings. If you look at other industries that are perhaps ahead of banking in terms of the impact of digital, the most profound impact has really been on the way that software and the Internet and hyperscaled cloud computing changed the product offering. When you look at our industry, most of the checking accounts that are out there look exactly the same as they did 10 years ago. So we are really, really laser-focused on finding ways like we did with Momentum Banking, like we've done with the managed services strategy and otherwise, to leverage the capabilities of technology to change that value exchange with our customers. I think that's probably the place where we're the most differentiated at the moment.
Ryan Nash
analystAnd maybe just as a follow-up, I think you mentioned whether it was at earnings or at a recent presentation that you guys are spending about $700 million a year on tech, and it's been growing about 10% a year for the last 5. How does it break down in terms of run the bank versus grow the bank, where you spend your money and how are you prioritizing?
James Leonard
executiveMaybe I'll jump in and take that one. The prioritization for us really comes down to 3 things. One is we're focused on growth, how to better lever technology to generate growth. And we look at that through acquire, deepen and retain, and you see that in a lot of the product offerings we've initiated over the past couple of years. So growth being the first prioritization. Second, customer experience, and you see that with the digital enablement we've been able to do, whether it's the Momentum offer, the customer recommendation engine we've rolled out to give a better experience to help customers with their next best product or just other mobile technologies. And then third is where can we lean the bank out and drive efficiencies, and you see that -- the best proof point there is $125 million of lean process automation we have teed up for 2022. So those are the -- how we prioritize. And then I do expect the tech budget will be up 10% in 2022, but some of those lean efficiencies will help fund that. And right now, the composition of our tech spend, it is 50% run the bank, 35% improve or develop the bank and 15% protect the bank. And we started this journey a couple of years ago, and it will continue for the next several years on platform modernization, as Tim mentioned, as we transition mainframe to cloud. And our goal is when we're finished with this exercise several years down the road that, that 50% and 35% will flip, and we'll have a cheaper unit cost going forward, and that will allow us to have even more of an allocation to tech development. So 50% would become the improve the bank and 35% would be the run the bank.
Ryan Nash
analystI wanted to ask you one more question to Tim before we get into the operating fundamentals. Fifth Third has been the leader in terms of partnering with fintechs and acquiring some others. How do you think about the competitive threat from fintechs? Obviously, it was a big discussion going in the meetings yesterday. What areas are you watching the most? And where are there opportunities to learn from them?
Timothy Spence
executiveYes. I think we have viewed fintech for quite some time now as both an opportunity and a threat, right? As I mentioned in my prepared remarks, a lot of the innovations, the product innovations in fintech, have inspired the things that we're doing with our core product offerings. So we have gotten the benefit of a lot of the customer-focused innovation that has materialized in that space. Sometimes through partnerships, as you mentioned, sometimes through outright acquisitions, and sometimes, through our own need to respond with our internal development product management disciplines. The currency of the realm in a bank like Fifth Third is a primary banking relationship, right? That's the account, as I mentioned, on the consumer side, that you use to manage your own household cash flows. And it's the transaction banking side of the business, it's the line of credit you use to manage liquidity in the commercial banking side of the business. So we are perhaps most focused on those fintech companies who have sought to disrupt that aspect of our ecosystem, which, frankly, today is the payments firms more than it is anything else, right? And I do believe they pose a credible threat. I mean as I mentioned earlier, you read through the material that those businesses generate, and they're always talking about customer value and the use of technology. You read through the digital disclosures in the banking sector, and it's entirely about -- it's channel-driven, right? It's self-service and throughput on e-commerce, as opposed to the focus on where the real long-term asset in technology exists. So we've had to modernize the way that we think about how we run our business, and we're going to have to continue to respond, because there's a lot of money and a lot of intellectual capital that have flowed into that space.
Ryan Nash
analystGreat. Jamie, switching to the near term. We're now 2 months into the quarter. You gave an update last month at a conference. I was hoping you could give us an update on how the quarter is progressing. Just given how much guidance you had out there, maybe just at a high level, can you give us an update on loan growth, fees, expenses and any soft feels on how you're feeling into 2022.
James Leonard
executiveSure. I was hoping to get through the day without talking about the quarter. But it's actually -- the quarter is lining up to be a nice cap to a record year for Fifth Third. So I guess from a headwind/tailwind perspective, I'll talk tailwind first. The best improving category relative to our October guide is NII. NII should be stable as opposed to down 1%. Hopefully, that was the takeaway you had from Tim's prepared remarks, which is loan growth. We continue to feel better and better about especially on the commercial side. C&I loans, our guide was initially up 4% to 5%, we should be in the up 5% to 6% category. However, consumer and CRE will be a little bit softer. So net-net, when you cut through it all, balances will be up 2% on an average basis is actually where we already are quarter-to-date. So feel good about the balance sheet and the momentum heading into 2022 from a loan perspective. And then deposits, we've actually had strong levels of growth ahead of expectations. Deposits are up about $4 billion for us, driven by customer acquisition as well as a little bit more seasonal growth, and perhaps a little bit of an offset with the softer line utilization that we talked about last month at BAM. But as Tim mentioned in his prepared remarks, line utilizations rebounded a bit. And so that's also helping. So when you net all of that out, along with a few other benefits in NII from the securities book, we should be flat sequentially. Now to be fair and balanced, the largest headwind we have is actually in fees. And it's not on core production, it's not on new customer acquisitions, it's on valuation marks. If the quarter were to have ended at the end of November, we would have had $20 million to $25 million of negative marks on the MSR and our AvidXchange holdings. We own about 1.7 million in the shares in the Avid IPO that we'll continue to hold into in 2022. So we do have some valuation headwinds through the end of November, but obviously, December has been a little bit better from that perspective. So we'll see how it plays out. But if I were to say headwinds/tailwinds, NII, maybe $10 million, to be good. Fees, we'll see. But valuation, headwinds as we sit here today.
Ryan Nash
analystGot it. Great. Maybe just to dig a tiny a bit deeper on the loan growth expectations. I mean you talked about up 5% to 6% in the quarter, which obviously sounds very, very strong. Can you maybe just give us some additional color on what you think are going to be the drivers of commercial loan growth? Are there any specific areas that you can outperform? And any headwinds that you have to overcome in the intermediate term?
James Leonard
executiveSo within the C&I book, the strongest momentum we've seen would be in the middle market. For Fifth Third, we run a regional approach. Our regions have all done a great job with new customer acquisition. You see that we think the best corollary to that. You see in the commitment growth that we highlighted on the page. From a geography perspective, quarter-to-date, the best performing regions from a middle market growth perspective would be North Carolina, California, Tennessee, Indiana. Texas would be our top third for our markets. And then within the Corporate Banking book, Corporate Banking continues to be robust. And it's really driven by we call the TMT vertical, as Tim mentioned, the telecom, media and technology vertical, as well as in health care. So we feel very good about the momentum that we're seeing, and it's really driven by, first, the talent as we've added additional relationship managers across the footprint, but especially in the Southeast, and then that is leading to that new client acquisitions.
Timothy Spence
executiveI think just to put a point on that. I mean, one of the things that's been nice to see this year is we're big believers in balance, right? There's a value to having the sort of multiregional footprint we do between the Midwest and the Southeast to have some high kind of legacy markets and some growth markets in terms of our middle market business like we have in California and Texas. But if you were to look back at the markets we've cited in the earnings calls, you would see that there really is this nice balance between the legacy markets and Fifth Third in the growth markets. The growth markets have been really strong this quarter. But production for RM in Chicago is running at 10% north of where it was prior to the MB merger for either Fifth Third or MB. So we are seeing good momentum there. And if you look at the expansion markets Jamie referenced in California and Texas, those are bilateral relationships they're adding primarily. The California market, the most mature of those, the one we have been in the longest, right, 65% of the business that they're doing is bilateral relationships. We'll, we're the only bank in the transaction. So it is unusual to generate that sort of growth out of a middle market expansion on this, and we have been very, very pleased with what we're getting from those relationships.
Ryan Nash
analystIt sounds like things are going really well on the commercial side. If you transition over to the consumer side, while you've had good pockets of growth, there's obviously a handful of headwinds, GreenSky, Ginnie Mae pool buyouts. Can you maybe just talk about some of the drivers of consumer loan growth where you're seeing the best opportunities? And how are you thinking about this as a driver of loan growth into 2022?
James Leonard
executiveFor us, we would like to see a better allocation of the balance sheet to Consumer and not just have all of the loan growth driven by Commercial. So over time, that has been a goal of ours. And so within Consumer, what I think we've done a very nice job in both the auto book and the specialty lending book with RV and marine. We'll do about $10 billion in originations this year. It's been a very attractive bridge to the other side of the rate environments. And so we feel very good about that asset class. I think card should turn the corner here. We were pretty disciplined from a credit perspective during the pandemic. And so we've been patient to turn credit card back on, but that will be underway and should provide improvement in 2022. Home equity has been a challenge for us in part because of the fintech and point-of-sale disintermediation. And so that's something we'll need to address over time, but I don't see that as a large driver of growth one way or the other. So I think we've got a little bit more work to do to really build out that consumer tech platform and lending. But in the meantime, I think you'll see nice pockets of growth within our balance sheet.
Ryan Nash
analystAnd maybe to follow up on one thing you talked about in the slides. Clearly, there's a lot of rate sensitivity when it comes to not only just the natural rate sensitivity of the balance sheet, but all the liquidity that you have sitting. And liquidity is above -- $30-plus billion above normal. It seems like inflation is no longer transitory. And it feels like we have a better sense. I think one of the big things here, I guess, is a lot of banks expecting rates to move up faster than forward markets are assuming. So has this changed your thought process at all on reinvesting some of this liquidity, Jamie?
James Leonard
executiveSo given the strong deposit growth, we're actually sitting on $36 billion of excess cash last night. So I guess one thing I didn't mention is NIM will probably be down a few basis points more simply because of the excess cash we're sitting on. So to your point, we're even more asset-sensitive. I still think patience is a virtue. I think the waiting is definitely the hardest part, as Tom Petty said, and we're living that every day. But I think it's the right call. We're fortunate that we're as well positioned as we are to be able to wait for that better day. The portfolio throws off about $1.5 billion in cash flows a quarter, which is the lowest amongst the peer group. We have the highest performing yield. So we can afford to be patient. We will be patient. And I do believe we will see those entry points that we're targeting sometime in 2022. I don't know that we'll get more rates than movement in 2022 than what the market expects. I'm probably a little bit of a nay-sayer there. But either way, I feel good about the momentum we're carrying into the year, the optionality that our balance sheet positioning has provided us. And when you add it all together with the expense discipline that we have, we feel very good about our ability to deliver positive operating leverage in 2022. And our plan that we're taking to the Board next week reflects positive operating leverage. We'll talk more details on the January earnings call, but we're committed to delivering that to our shareholders next year.
Ryan Nash
analystMaybe just to follow up on that comment, and Tim, please do jump in. One of the things we heard a lot about yesterday was just the rising impacts of inflation and the impact that, that could have on the business, whether it's on wages or other parts. Can you maybe just talk a little bit about how that's impacting Fifth Third? And Jamie, you said you're committed to positive operating leverage, which is great to hear. Just maybe can the two of you talk about what are some of the moving pieces that you'd want to highlight to investors? And what are some of the tipping points to determine whether or not you do, in fact, deliver positive operating leverage?
Timothy Spence
executiveWe'll start with me...
James Leonard
executiveGo ahead, and then I'll see how much time you leave me to jump in.
Timothy Spence
executiveYes, there you go. So I think there are a couple of things there. So as it relates to our own core business and our expense platform, we have the benefit of coming into what is obviously a very tight labor market, having been the first of the regional banks to hit $18 an hour in terms of minimum wage. And that happened in 2019. So we are not experiencing the same level of inflation at the entry-level roles that you see in a lot of other financial institutions that you're hearing about is coming because we had been pretty proactive. We were the first bank in the country to $15 an hour, and then certainly the first in our footprint to $18 an hour after that. But there is no question that there's a war for talent out there. And as long as we have 6,000 banks in the U.S., there are going to be a lot of employment options for the top-performing people. And so we are -- always, we have a strong performance-based culture and our big believers in rewarding the outperformers, and I think we're going to continue to do that on an ongoing basis. As it relates to our clients business, we're not seeing a lot of strain yet, but we also don't have heavy concentrations in the segments that tend to be most exposed to inflation, right? It's a super prime lending portfolio. We don't do any subprime, the majority of our deposit base as you saw earlier is customers who may be living paycheck to paycheck, but they do have liquidity, right, as the Momentum customers illustrated. And the byproduct of that is they don't feel the squeeze to quite the same degree that folks who are living with less slack in their lives experience as they see increases in gas prices, increases in the grocery store and otherwise. And on the Commercial side of the business, our concentrations are really in the core middle market and our industry verticals. Business Banking has not been a business that historically has been outsized relative to the rest of the commercial business. And the byproduct of that is our clients have had the ability to exercise a little bit more control over their input costs, with the exception of some of the really wild swings in commodity prices that they saw last year.
James Leonard
executiveAnd I think from a macro perspective, the banks should be pretty solid beneficiaries from an inflationary -- controlled inflationary environment, takes inflation off the table. And so I was a little surprised by some of the negative comments yesterday. But from our perspective, as we sit here today, we're 80%. Our asset sensitivity is tied to the short end of the curve, and that's a little higher than what it normally would be just given all the excess cash we have. So normally, we'd be 2/3 to the short end. So some movement up in the short end will be productive for us. I think the Fed will manage through so that there's not too much inflation going forward, and they'll manage through this scenario. I think that will give a productive outcome to the banking sector.
Ryan Nash
analystYes. I do think one part of inflation we maybe are not talking about, since I see some of our friends from Alabama in the back of the room, is the rating or ranking inflation we've seen for SEC teams, and they call it football playoffs. So we are looking forward to the Cincinnati Bearcats resetting order there in the football playoffs. So...
Timothy Spence
executiveAs diehard Notre Dame fan, I do feel your pain.
James Leonard
executiveWe need to get a Cincinnati chili, Alabama barbecue bet going on, on the lineup.
Ryan Nash
analystWell, unfortunately, we are out of time, but please join me in thanking the team.
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