The PNC Financial Services Group, Inc. (PNC) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Hello and welcome to the Annual Meeting of Shareholders of The PNC Financial Services Group. Please note that today's meeting is being recorded. You can submit questions or comments at any time by clicking on the message icon located in the upper right corner of the meeting page. Now my pleasure to turn today's meeting over to Bill Demchak, Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer of The PNC Financial Services Group. Mr. Demchak, the floor is yours.

Thank you. And good morning, everybody. As Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer of The PNC Financial Services Group, I will preside as the Chairman of the 2020 Annual Meeting of Shareholders, and I now call that meeting to order. On behalf of our Board of Directors and management team, I welcome you to today's meeting, which we are holding in a virtual-only format, given ongoing public health concerns about COVID-19. Before we move to the official business of our meeting, I'll provide just a few comments on the pandemic, which is having a profound impact on the global economy, people's lives and the way we run your company. The challenges facing our country, as a result, are unprecedented. All of us with PNC are working hard to do our part to help our customers, communities and employees navigate these extraordinary times, and we are doing so from a position of strength, with the talent and technology as well as capital and liquidity to weather this storm. Our nearly 52,000 employees are working incredibly hard to help support our customers, many of whom are experiencing extreme financial hardship. I'd like to thank them for their hard work and dedication. I also want to thank all the health care and other essential services workers who are courageously and tirelessly working to help people in our communities. I'd like to also acknowledge those who have been diagnosed -- or diagnosed with or lost a loved one to COVID-19. On behalf of PNC, our thoughts are with you. And finally, I'd like to thank our shareholders for your understanding and flexibility in moving to this virtual format. We value our continued engagement with you and hope that this virtual format will allow all of those who want to participate in our annual meeting to do so safely regardless of their location. Now let me provide an overview of how the meeting will proceed. First, I'll introduce our directors and representatives of our independent public accounting firm, who will be available to address questions during the Q&A portion of the meeting. Next, our Corporate Secretary will provide a report on procedural matters. I will then introduce the 4 management proposals on the agenda for this meeting and answer any questions that pertain to those proposals. The polls will be opened, and we will take a brief pause for the casting of any final votes prior to closing the polls. Our Corporate Secretary will then provide the preliminary voting results, and I will adjourn the meeting. After the meeting is adjourned, I will provide remarks on our 2019 and first quarter performance, and I'll address how PNC is navigating the current environment. We will then hold a general question-and-answer session to discuss matters that are not on the agenda but appropriate for discussion. This meeting will be conducted in accordance with the regulations for conduct, which, together with today's agenda, are available to you by selecting the appropriately titled document link on the meeting page. By attending this meeting, you agree to abide by the regulations for conduct. And as a reminder, because this is a meeting of our shareholders, only those who entered the meeting as a shareholder using a control number will be permitted to vote and ask questions. Shareholders may submit written questions by clicking on the Message icon located to the right of the lower case i and the light gray bar at the top of the meeting page. I will respond personally or designate another person to respond to questions we receive that are appropriate for discussion. If multiple questions are submitted on the same topic, we will summarize them and respond collectively. We have allocated 1 hour for the meeting, including all questions and comments. Please keep your questions and comments brief in order to give us the opportunity to address as many questions as possible. We will make every effort to address questions and comments that are consistent with the regulations of conduct. I would like to introduce our director nominees who have joined our meeting today: Joseph Alvarado, Charles Bunch, Debra Cafaro, Marjorie Rodgers Cheshire; Andrew Feldstein, Richard Harshman; Daniel Hesse, Linda Medler, Martin Pfinsgraff, Toni Townes-Whitley and Michael Ward. All members of our Executive Committee have joined the meeting as well. Finally, I would like to introduce Sam Kennedy and Bryan Heft, representatives from PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, our independent registered public accounting firm. They will be available to answer questions during the general question-and-answer session. Also in attendance with me is Greg Jordan, our General Counsel and Chief Administrative Officer; and Alicia Powell, our Corporate Secretary. Alicia, please present the Secretary's report.

Mr. Chairman, I have in my possession an affidavit from Computershare Trust Company NA, PNC's transfer agent. The affidavit states that the notice of internet availability of proxy materials was mailed to certain shareholders on March 17, 2020, the day they were given access to our proxy materials. Certain other shareholders were mailed paper copies or received electronic delivery of these proxy materials, including the notice of annual meeting beginning on March 17, 2020. The materials were distributed to shareholders of record as of January 31, 2020. The Board of Directors appointed Computershare as the judge of election for this meeting. The judge of election keeps a certified listing of all shareholders of record. A list of shareholders as of the record date is available for inspection by shareholders who entered this meeting as a shareholder using a control number by selecting the appropriately titled Document Link on the meeting page. On behalf of Computershare, Joe Roach is supervising the voting, and he has delivered his oath of office to me. The affidavit, notice and oath will be filed with the records of this meeting. The judge of election has certified that at the beginning of this meeting, there were present in person via virtual format or by proxy, 387,452,155 votes or 90.05% of the total voting power. Therefore, a quorum is present. Copies of the minutes from the 2019 Annual Meeting of Shareholders are available from me upon request. I would also like to remind those attending the meeting that as reflected on this slide, our materials and information in the Investor Relations section of our pnc.com website include cautionary statements regarding forward-looking information and non-GAAP financial information, and I urge you to read those cautionary statements. Mr. Chairman, this concludes my report.

Thank you, Alicia. Based on your report, I find that proper notice has been given and a quorum is present. Therefore, this meeting has been properly convened. The purpose of this meeting is to consider and act upon 4 management proposals. They are: first, the election of 12 nominated directors; second, the ratification of the Audit Committee's selection of PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP as PNC's independent registered public accounting firm for 2020; third, the advisory approval of the compensation of PNC's named executive officers; and finally, the approval of the PNC employee stock purchase plan as amended and restated effective January 1, 2020. I will now ask for a single motion to introduce these proposals. May I have such a motion?

Mr. Chairman, my name is Bryan Gill. I am a shareholder, and I so move.

May I have a second to this motion?

Mr. Chairman, my name is Greg Jordan. I am a shareholder, and I second the motion.

I declare that these proposals have been properly introduced and moved, and I will pause to allow for questions related to these proposals. Questions unrelated to these proposals may be asked by shareholders during the general question-and-answer session that will follow the adjournment of this meeting.

We have no questions related to the proposals at this time.

Okay. So no questions. All proposals are now formally before the meeting. I declare that the polls -- or I declare the polls to be open. Shareholders who have not voted or wish to change their vote may do so now by clicking on the Cast Your Vote link appearing on the Meeting page and following the instructions provided there. Any shareholder who has already voted and does not want to change their vote need not take any further action. We will pause briefly to allow voting to occur. [Voting]

Okay. Just give us a couple more moments here. Thank you. I declare the polls to be closed, and I'd like to call upon the Secretary to provide the preliminary voting results.

The judge of election has provided a preliminary report to me, which certifies that a majority of the votes cast were for the election of all 12 director nominees; for the ratification of the selection of PricewaterhouseCoopers; for the advisory approval of the compensation of PNC's named executive officers; and for the approval of the PNC employee stock purchase plan, as amended and restated, effective January 1, 2020. I will file the preliminary report with the records of this meeting. The final vote tally will be disclosed on a Form 8-K that we will file with the SEC.

Thank you, Alicia. Subject to certification of the final voting results by the judge of election, I declare that the shareholders have approved the 4 proposals introduced by management. This concludes the formal business of the meeting. I declare the annual meeting to be adjourned. Now with the close of the business portion of today's meeting, I'll offer just a few remarks on our 2019 and the first quarter 2020 results and then address what I am sure is top of mind for all of you, the unprecedented environment, which we are operating and how PNC is navigating through it. With respect to 2019, our performance was strong. Against the backdrop of the continuing change and disruption in our industry, we increased earnings per share, achieved record revenue, improved our efficiency ratio and generated positive operating leverage, and we grew both our commercial and consumer loan portfolios as well as deposits. Moving on to the first quarter of 2020, our results were also solid. We grew loans and deposits and maintained strong capital and liquidity positions. But the extraordinary changes in the economy and the broad-based response to the COVID-19 outbreak had a material impact on our provision for credit losses. While the pandemic may be the greatest challenge that we have collectively faced, this is the kind of adverse scenario for which we have prepared. The pandemic and economic environment are having a profound impact on all of our constituencies, and we are committed to supporting them through this crisis. We have nearly 52,000 employees who are working incredibly hard every day to do just that. Teams across PNC are working tirelessly to serve our customers and assist those experiencing financial hardship due to COVID-19 impacts, embracing their responsibility to deliver essential banking services that are critical to our nation's infrastructure. Our employees are making loans, waiving and refunding fees, and postponing payments during this challenging time. Thanks to our technology, in which we have invested over time, more than 30,000 of our employees are working remotely. For frontline and other employees whose roles cannot be performed remotely, we immediately mobilized to mitigate risks to them and their families and implemented a modified branch operation strategy and enhanced pay provisions to acknowledge their extra effort and dedication. Of course, at the same time that we are supporting our customers, we continue to play a critical role in upholding our commitment to the communities we serve. Our regional presidents, together with the PNC Foundation, are allocating more than $30 million to coronavirus relief efforts across our markets. Over the last month, thousands of PNC employees, including our senior executives, have worked long days to help our customers apply for loans under the Paycheck Protection program within the Cares Act. This has been an important and unprecedented effort targeted at assisting our customers to keep their employees on the payroll during this pandemic. We built a new digital portal and business process to receive and review tens of thousands of applications over the course of just a few days. Our team worked collaboratively to conduct the review and underwriting required by the legislation in order to support our customers in registering their loans with the Small Business Administration. This massive work set was not without its challenges and imperfections. PNC was able to help more than 21,000 customers registered with the SBA for $9.6 billion in PPP loans before the entire $349 billion program was allocated. However, we had tens of thousands of other customers who did not get through in time and who were understandably unhappy and disappointed in missing out on this important program. Our team continued to work on these remaining applications in the hope that the federal government would approve additional funding, which did occur late last week, making another $250 billion in PPP funds available beginning at 10:30 a.m. yesterday. Through the efforts of our team, PNC submitted for registration to the SBA approximately 55,000 additional customer applications yesterday. This was done primarily through a bulk upload process approved by the SBA, and we expect that it will take the SBA some time to process the applications before it can advise us whether these applications have been registered and to give us a confirmed list of those that have been registered. We recognize that the SBA is working incredibly hard to process an unprecedented number of applications under the PPP program. While we have no guarantee that all the applications we submitted yesterday will be registered by the SBA, we hope they will because that will allow us to help tens of thousands of small businesses, including many from low- and moderate-income communities and nonprofit organizations. So while at the time of this meeting, the SBA has not yet completed registration of the applications we submitted. If and when complete, we estimate that through this tremendous team effort, we will have helped small businesses that employ more than 1 million people, which, of course, was the entire focus of the Paycheck Protection Program. We are also helping customers by granting thousands of requests for extensions, deferrals and forbearance. We have already completed more than 156,000 consumer requests on loans totaling $9.3 billion, a large percentage of which are guaranteed by the government housing agencies. In addition, we have granted more than $2.6 million in emergency personal loans and have waived more than $8.1 million in deposit fees due to COVID-19. In closing, I want to thank my 52,000 colleagues at PNC for their dedication and hard work. They are going above and beyond to make a difference for our customers and our communities during this pandemic. All of us at PNC are focused on doing our best to support the economy and help our country get through this challenging time, relying on our culture and commitment and financial strength. I would like to thank all of our shareholders for your continued support and confidence, and I can promise you that we will never take that for granted. I will now pause to allow for questions from our shareholders in the remaining time allocated for the meeting. As a reminder, shareholders who entered the meeting using a control number can submit questions by clicking on the Message icon located to the right with the lower case i in the light gray bar at the top of the meeting page.

Well, as we wait for the Q&A to compile, perhaps we can discuss a topic that many shareholders are interested in. And that is the safety of the dividend. And how do you think PNC can continue to support it during these challenging times?

Sure. Thanks, Bryan. This came up on our earnings call, not surprisingly. We believe that at this point in time, with our outlook on the economy, that we have the capital and liquidity to be able to comfortably support our dividend. We, in fact, ran a very severe stress case, basically mirroring the Federal Reserve's annual CCAR stress test. And even in that instance, we still had capital ratios that were well in excess of the required minimum and should be able to comfortably maintain our dividend. Now I say all that and caveat it by the simple notion that we are in a period of unknown and things could be worse than our worst case. Obviously, if we progress to that environment, which we don't expect to, but if we did, we would be continually working through our capital policies and updating our Board in making decisions on long-term dividend policy. Again, we don't expect to get there. But through the normal governance of this company, it's something that we will keep our eye on.

Well, it looks like we have no further questions.

Okay. If there are no further questions, we're ending very early. I appreciate everybody's time and interest and attention, and thank you all for attending.

Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes today's conference call. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect. Everyone have a good day.