Truist Financial Corporation (TFC) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

December 8, 2020

New York Stock Exchange US Financials Banks conference_presentation 38 min

Earnings Call Speaker Segments

Ryan Nash

analyst
#1

Hello, everyone. Joining us for what could be his final time, we're excited to have Chairman and CEO of Truist, Kelly King. Kelly and the team have continued to successfully execute on their MOE integration, bringing together 2 regional powerhouses to form a bank with industry-leading returns and efficiency. Despite the pandemic, they have moved full steam ahead with the integration, including completing the first client-facing integration, and are now executing on delivering $1.6 billion of net cost saves while also delivering upside to revenues. So with that, I'm going to pass it over to Kelly, who is going to walk us through a few slides, and then we are going to have a fireside chat. For the Q&A, Kelly will also be joined by Chief Financial Officer, Daryl Bible. So with that, I'm going to pass it over to Kelly.

Kelly King

executive
#2

Thanks, Ryan, and good morning, everybody. Thanks for joining the conference. We want to give you a view of kind of the year-end review. Yesterday, it was actually our 1-year anniversary, and talk about where we came from, where we are and where we're going, and then we'll do Q&A, as Ryan described. We said a year ago when we closed the deal that this was really 2 strong companies coming together in a way that we believe will create a better, stronger, more successful institution, and that is well underway. We said that the thesis of the merger was really about being highly synergistic financially compelling and very transformative. We talked about the synergies being around culture. And I can tell you that, that has proven to be absolutely true and even better than we could have expected. We talked about the great business synergies between the BB&T community bank and insurance and the SunTrust investment bank and wholesale banking. We talked about the expense synergies and the revenue synergies. And all of that is proving to be true. We said we thought this would be a financially compelling merger. We talked about a 51% efficiency ratio and a 22% return on tangible common equity. And we believe we are still on route towards those goals. We said we would be able to enhance fee income because of the tremendous cross-fertilization between our 2 client bases. And we've seen early signs that, that is working really, really well. We said we have a very strong risk management culture, strong capital and strong liquidity. And that's exactly what we have. We said it would be transformative. And this is really the most important and exciting part of the combination. The world has changed. We clearly are living in a different world for a lot of reasons, as we all know. But really, from a longer-term point of view, is really about digital transformation and the disruptions that are required to make sure that one is able to deliver a highly focused client-centric, very, very high-value proposition. We are really able to do that. We're focusing heavily on innovation and technology. Soon, we'll be opening our new innovation and tech center in Charlotte. It's going to be really exciting. Hope some of you will be able to come and see that. We're in fantastic markets. We're in 7 of the top 10 fastest-growing markets in the country. And we have great talent, and we're attracting great talent. Truist is turning out to be a location that people would like to be a part of. If you're following along, I'm on Slide 6. I just want to point out some of the things that we have been able to accomplish in just this last very brief year. We've been able to focus on our identity. Our brand has been rolled out. It's been extraordinarily well received by our teammates, by our communities, by our clients. It's an exciting brand. It has vigor in it. And it has a lot of implications of trusting relationships, which we really like. We did a huge amount of work with regard to our culture, our purpose, our mission and our values. You've heard me say before that it's always the most important for, I believe, any company. And we've made giant strides with regard to pulling together 2 cultures that are already very, very well aligned. And to be honest, the COVID crisis has caused the bonding of those 2 cultures to come together quicker than Bill and I could have possibly have expected. We rolled out our first Corporate Social Responsibility Report. We're very proud of the things that we're doing in the communities to make our communities better. We spent a lot of time, as did most this year, focusing on diversity and inclusion. And we've made tremendous progress. And yet there's ways to go. We've had over 260 events, we call it Days of Understanding, where we meet with our teammates, and we talk about the challenges, the reality of what's going on in terms of racial inequity and social injustice. And we are gaining great understandings with regard to what we can do to lean in and make that better for our teammates and for our communities and for the world at large. We said that we would increase our diversity in our senior leadership group from 12% to 15% in 3 years or so. And we are working really, really hard on that. We did a lot with regard to crisis response. We did $13 billion in PPP launch. We were the fourth largest in the country, larger than our size. We feel great about that. We did about $100 million of unusual support for our teammates, like extra pay for the people on the frontlines, pay for people in terms of getting [ HP ], the day care support for their children. We did a $50 million trust -- Truist Cares program, where we put out hundreds and hundreds of programs to help agencies that are dealing with the most in need in our communities. And we did about 500,000 consumer accommodations and about 30,000 or so business accommodations for our clients to help them through this difficult period of time. We made real progress in terms of integration. We did Truist Securities, and it went off really, really smoothly, very happy about that. We created what we call our blended branch approach, which allows us to close branches faster than we might have anticipated. We did a seamless divestiture of about 30 locations. We importantly rolled out 2 concepts we call IRM or Integrated Relationship Management, and T3, which is a concept of the necessary blend today, the seamless integration between touch and technology, yielding a higher level of trust, which gives you the highest value proposition. And then we did a lot of other small, I think, HR types of conversions that go along with this type of process, and that has gone very, very well also. So there's been a lot of integration activity already, and much to come. And yet we've still had already top-tier year-to-date performance. We've had accelerated cost saves in terms of things like vendor programs, in terms of real estate consolidations, which we're moving at a faster pace than we thought we could have. There are many redundancies when you put together 2 big companies that we are moving through eliminating, and we are accelerating our branch closing process. And we'll be at about our 10% CET1 target as we approach year-end. If you're looking at slides, at Slide 7. Just to point out a few of the things that we've accomplished, not in a boastful way, but just something that we are proud of. And we're really kind of just getting started, but our adjusted return on average assets is substantially higher than the peer median. Return on -- adjusted return on average tangible common equity is over twice what the peer median is. Our adjusted efficiency ratio is already 55% and meaningfully better than peer median. Net interest margin is better. Nonperforming assets are lower. So we've made really good progress in terms of performance, even in the midst of a very, very challenging environment. So where do we go in '21? Really 4 cornerstones of what we're focusing on. But #1 is focusing on executing the merger. We understand that it's critical. But then realizing the synergies, expense and revenue, continue to enhance our franchise and investing in the future. We're making really good progress and have great plans. I said we did Truist Securities already. We're well underway in terms of our conversions with regard to Wealth and Mortgage conversions, they'll be in the spring. We're already testing all the protocols necessary for the primary core conversion as we head into early '22. And we are really building what I call a new bank. I mean we are picking best-in-breed, best-in-class systems from both SunTrust and BB&T. And so when we're through this, we're going to have really best-in-class systems across the organization, which makes us really, really able to provide best-in-class client service quality. And that will be something that will stand us well for many, many years. We are realizing the synergies of the merger, as I indicated earlier. We're on track to achieve 65% of our $1.6 billion in net expense savings by the fourth quarter of '21. I think maybe in the market, there was a little bit of confusion about that recently, but I want you to be clear. We're very committed to that. We feel very confident about that. For example, we're closing about 100 branches again this month. We'll close about 225 branches in March. So we're able to accelerate that, all the real estate closings, vendor management contract renegotiations, as I described. And importantly, and I think long term, most importantly, we are really leveraging up our IRM capabilities, that's Integrated Relationship Management, because our clients on both sides of these 2 companies have great needs that the other side of the company had great services for. So our insurance services are readily being made available through our SunTrust heritage clients. Capital markets, corporate and institutional services are being delivered over to our heritage BB&T clients. And so all of that is going really, really well. We're enhancing the franchise. We continue to build on this culture. This is very strong, but it's getting stronger by the day. We're making huge investments in technologies I described, particularly around our digital capabilities. We're looking at ways that we can enhance digital service delivery and the basics like our mobile platform, our U platform, which has recently been ranked #1 in banks, and we can make it even better. We have opportunities to enhance our capabilities through our national LightStream operation, which delivers today unsecured consumer lending. There are ways we can enhance that, and we're working hard on that. And we continue to expand through bolt-on acquisitions, our insurance operation, which is very important to us in terms of revenue and profitability, but importantly with regard to diversification. You may have seen, just in the last day, we announced we'll be closing 5 smaller acquisitions this quarter. The insurance industry is consolidating very rapidly, and we are and expect to continue to be a very important part of that process. This Wellington operation that we just announced in Texas is fantastic. It's really an insurtech with -- they've developed tremendous digital capabilities to deliver insurance products on a very, very efficient basis. And we believe we can expand that substantially along -- beyond the Texas market that they are operating in so well today. And we'll continue to invest in the future. Our Innovation and Technology Center is well underway. It will be opening soon. We're excited about that. We've been able to attract really great talent from within or with outside of the industry. I take a lot of pride in that because Truist has a reputation of being a place that people want to come, be a part of because we stand for better. We want to inspire and build better lives and communities. And people want to be a part of that. We continue to increase our marketing budget in terms of telling our story, which we think is a very, very good story. And we continue to invest in our communities, which is really, really important today because our communities are struggling. And we want to do more than our part in terms of helping our communities get through this difficult period of time. And so we can -- continue to invest huge amounts of money. We're investing over 3 years about $60 billion in our community commitment program in terms of affordable housing, all types of educational initiatives and support programs. So we're very excited about that. In a nutshell, Ryan, we are an institution that is driven by purpose. Our purpose is to inspire and build better lives and communities. That's what we get excited about. It's what I get excited about every day, even after almost 50 years now. And it's a lot of fun. It's a lot of fun to go out and help people get through challenges and continue to move forward and live their dreams and goals and hopes and likes. So that's our prepared remarks. We're happy to talk about anything you'd like to talk about.

Ryan Nash

analyst
#3

Great. And thanks for those prepared remarks, Kelly. So on one of the slides, you talked about the 2021 priorities. There's obviously 1 year complete for the MOE. And given that you're -- I think you're slated to retire in the latter part of the year, what are you most focused on for the year ahead?

Kelly King

executive
#4

Yes. So just to be clear for everybody, I will retire as CEO in September 12, my birthday, of '21. I will stay with the company for a while. I'll be Executive Chairman to support Bill and his new role as CEO, and I'll be on the Board for a couple of years. But we're excited about Bill's transition. He's obviously been a very accomplished CEO. He will do a great job. Very, very excited about that. But what I want to really spend most of my time on next year, Ryan, is focusing on continuing to solidify down through the company our culture. It really is the most important part of what's created great performance in the past, will in the future. And we're in great shape, and I want to continue to work on that. I want to work on more on this IRM concept. It's a powerful concept. A lot of people haven't quite yet realized, I don't think, how important 2 paradigm shifts are in all of retail, and particularly the banking. And it's IRM, Integrated Relationship Management, how you put all of your services together to meet all the clients' needs. And also, something we call T3. You've heard me talk about it, where that stands, the technology and touch yielding trust. And you really have to integrate those 2 together. So I'm going to be focusing on culture, IRM and T3 as we go through next year.

Ryan Nash

analyst
#5

You mentioned culture, Kelly. Obviously, you've had to bring together 2 cultures. Can you maybe talk about what some of the best-of-breed items that you've brought from each bank? And what have been the biggest challenges that you face bringing the 2 together?

Kelly King

executive
#6

Yes. So I think from the SunTrust side, it's well known, I think, that they had a really, really well-developed corporate and institutional group investment bank. We think, #1, regional investment bank that is targeted on a real white space out there below the top echelon of investment banks with very, very biggest megadeals, and all the way down through midsized. We're finding that lots and lots and lots of midsized companies need to really hold some fully developed investment banking capabilities. SunTrust had that. So we're levering that over to the BB&T side, enhancing it on the SunTrust side. Our insurance operation, which is now sixth largest in the country, seventh largest in the world, and we're enhancing that through acquisitions, as you know. That's a big deal. I mean everybody needs insurance. And so we're finding that our SunTrust clients are really happy to find that they can have one-stop shopping, and we can provide that as well. It's really interesting. The 2 companies are so complementary. Over the last few years, BB&T has spent a lot of time on the backroom, backroom systems, data centers and new GL systems. SunTrust has spent a lot of time on front room system, new mortgage system, new teller system. And as we combine those, we really leapfrog and get to be best-in-class in pretty much every system. So it's been great. No big negative surprises. Obviously, we were surprised by COVID and all that's going with that. But I mean in terms of the merger, we've both done lots of mergers, and we knew what we were getting into. We planned well, and we're executing well. And so it's really going very nicely.

Ryan Nash

analyst
#7

Got it. So maybe a 2-part question. One, I know you did your first client-facing integration. Can you maybe share with us how that went? And what some of the lessons learned were? And what it can mean for the rest of the integration? And then you just talked about taking best-of-breed technology from both sides. How is that making the integration more challenging? And lastly, I know in the past, you talked about banks were spending around 10% of revenues on technology, and that can increase, I don't know, maybe 15%. I'm curious, is that still your view? Or has that evolved as the world has become a lot more digital?

Kelly King

executive
#8

Yes. So thanks. We did Truist Securities, and it was flawless. And our people like to say, we can claim -- lay claim to the first virtual major conversion in the industry. And our people really are very proud of that. I am as well. It's gone extraordinarily well. And we're well underway in terms of other conversions. We are now doing the middle stages of getting ready for our mortgage and wealth conversions, which will happen in the spring. We're doing the early protocol work with regard to the core bank conversion. It's not like you just kind of wait and do that at the end of '21, early '22. That's all huge. Most of the work is done long before you get to that. So we're way down the road with regard to all of that. So I think that the actual conversions are going really, really well. And -- but look, it's important to keep investing in technology. Whatever you invested in historically, you need to invest more in the future. The world has changed, and it's not going back. And COVID has taught us that the world is ready for more digital capability. There's a massive paradigm shift here. We believe that is here to stay. And that's why we are embracing so heavily this T3 kind of stuff because you've got to have the very best in technology. We are really great today, for example, on mobile platform that's recently listed as the best in banks in the country. We're very proud about that. But you really have to reinvest every day because the world is changing, the expectations are increasing. And so we will continue to do that through our Innovation and Technology Center and other approaches. So I would suspect, as I've said earlier, over time, you will see companies investing more into 15% kind of range in technology in a broad sense because of the necessity of staying up with a really -- look, we've not even gotten to quantum computing it. And when that hits, I mean this would be a giant retooling for everybody. So yes, we're going to have to be willing to and we are willing to invest heavily in technology.

Ryan Nash

analyst
#9

So in your prepared remarks, Kelly, you highlighted your confidence in delivering on the $1.6 billion of net cost saves. This will allow you to free up capacity so that you can invest in the business. Can you maybe just talk about where you're seeing opportunities to invest across the business right now? And second, how should we think about the return of these investments over time in terms of better growth?

Kelly King

executive
#10

Yes. So I think for us, it's a wide range of investment opportunities. Some of it is in the pure infrastructure, making sure we take the best-in-class mortgage system, for example, that SunTrust had and moving that over, which is in process, to the BB&T side and being sure we take full advantage of the very recent, state-of-art data centers that BB&T had developed and pulling all that together. That's really, really important as we pull all of this together. So I think that the basic technologies where we are investing a lot of time and energy. And then we are moving along on other client facing. We are working in the early stages of expanding the digital capacity of LightStream, which as you know, is today, our national -- one of the very top national digital providers of unsecured consumer lending. And we continuously get some net -- really strong Net Promoter Scores. We can expand that and plan to expand that in terms of the product offerings. Not so much the products themselves, like we may start with deposits, we have plenty of deposits, but we want to use as a tool to connect with our clients in a way deeper than just unsecured consumer lending because we want to have really deep robust relationships through that digital platform. And we'll be doing that. We'll be working on a -- or working on a robo investing digital platform for our clients as we go forward. So we have a variety of infrastructure and then a strong variety of pure client-focused technology as we roll it out.

Ryan Nash

analyst
#11

One of the other things you highlighted was the importance of IRM. I think last year, when you were here, you said you'd hope for up to $1 billion of revenue synergies. Maybe just talk about how you're using IRM or Integrated Relationship Management to drive this. And how are you feeling about the absolute level of synergies you can deliver? And what areas are you feeling the most confident on over the next few years?

Kelly King

executive
#12

Yes. So this IRM concept, Ryan, is a powerful concept. I mean it's like -- in every business, certainly on the financial businesses, we have certain specialists, think insurance agents, mortgage processors, capital market specialists and product-centric areas. And that's great because you bring the highest talent and capabilities on those particular service areas. But the client wants you to integrate all that. The client really wants to have a trusted adviser, a trusted relationship so that we can bring together a multitude of services for them because it's highly efficient for them. And of course, it's highly efficient and profitable for us to be able to deliver quite a range of services. So this IRM concept is something that's very powerful we continue to work on. And the early returns are very, very promising. I must admit, this was one little surprise out of this. I thought it would take us longer to get our people on both sides to warm up to the new products just because of the nature of change. But the opposite has happened. And I think maybe because of COVID, there's not been a lot of loan demand and so forth, the opportunity for our people to go out and offer new tools has been a very exciting time for them. So rather than just stop delivering what we always were having to deliver in a very difficult COVID environment, our people have been really excited because they've got all these new tools in the tool chest. And the clients are receptive to hear about the new products and services that we have to offer. So I really think as we go forward, it's hard to measure today mathematically, but the receptivity of this is incredible. And pretty much every product that we offer, every client needs, and so on the consumer side or on the commercial side. And then -- and that's the genius of financial service delivery today, to create the value proposition based on trust so that the client trusts us to provide solutions to a lot of their challenges as they pursue their dreams and goals and hopes in life. And that's where we have a big distinct advantage.

Ryan Nash

analyst
#13

Kelly, you always have a great pulse on how corporates are feeling as well as how Main Street consumers are doing. We now have some degrees of certainty with a handful of vaccines that are over 90% effective. Can you talk first on the corporate side, what are you hearing in terms of willingness to borrow? I know you talked about some pipelines improving. Can we see that snapback at some point you talked about? And then second, on the consumer side, can you maybe just talk about the areas that you see driving growth into 2021? Are there any areas where you're fine-tuning underwriting to try to expand the growth opportunities into next year?

Kelly King

executive
#14

So first, I think it's important for our viewers to emphasize, and they can decide as they agree with it or not, but I worry a little bit that everybody is too pessimistic in terms of where we are going in terms of '21. I really do think there's an opportunity for a snapback in this economy as we get into the year. And you've heard me say, Ryan, it's because there is nothing structurally wrong with the economy. We shut it down as we should have because of the crisis. But unlike previous cycles where there were clear bubbles in the economy, that's not the case in this space. This was a 10-year robust economy, a 3.5% unemployment rate. So assuming the vaccines come through, as we fully think they will, and assuming the response is as I think it will be in terms of a robust increase in confidence, consumer and corporate, then you will see an accelerating economy and because the underlying infrastructure of businesses has not been eroded. Now I'm talking mid and up. There's a bifurcated economy. The micro businesses are really struggling. Don't get me saying something different. That's a real challenge for everybody. But for mid and upper, it is -- they're doing fine. We did a series of meetings recently where we talked to a lot of our clients and prospects. So we did some polling to just ask on how they were feeling. Things like how are you feeling about the next year? Or are you think about expanding? Or are you thinking about adding employees? And we got about 80% that were neutral to very positive. Only about 20% were very negative, which I was very pleased to see. So -- and they're saying things like it's time get on with it. We've learned from 2008. We came into this. We had stronger capital, stronger liquidity. We hunkered down. We feel confident about the vaccine coming out in terms of an ultimate solution. And we're ready to kind of get back in the game. So I take that as being very encouraging.

Ryan Nash

analyst
#15

Daryl has been kind enough to join us, and I haven't had a chance to ask him anything. So Daryl, maybe just digging in. The outlook for the core margin has been to stabilize, then they reported to fall amid lower purchase accounting. I guess we've got a little bit of an improvement in the rate backdrop. So can the core margin stabilize from here? And if not, what do we need to see happen in the rate backdrop? And then second, Kelly just talked about there's some hope that loan growth could improve. And whether we see that or not, do you think you have enough levers between stabilizing margins and balance sheet growth to actually see core NII growing next year?

Daryl Bible

executive
#16

Yes. Thanks for the question, Ryan. What I would say is that loan growth would be key to keeping our core margin relatively flat, increasing. It's really a focus on trying to grow the higher-yielding assets as much as possible as that plays out. I think with the moves that we've made with cutting deposit rates and trying to put in floors on our commercial clients and moving our excess liquidity into the securities portfolio, our core margin will hold up relatively well for the first part of '21 from that perspective. We do also are looking at our PPP repayments. And as that process has started, we are seeing really good levels of payoffs occurring such that forgiveness, that we were originally saying it was 75% and could be up closer to 90%, which will obviously keep our margins higher for the first part of '21, too.

Ryan Nash

analyst
#17

Got it. Maybe switching to some of the growth areas of the bank. Insurance has been a real bright spot as I think we've entered a hard market. Kelly, can you maybe talk about the opportunities to expand that business, both organically through cross-sell? And then also, you talked about these 5 deals that you just did, including Wellington. And I think these are supposed to add over $100 million of revenue. Can you maybe just talk about, over time, what is the aspiration in terms of how big you want to get insurance back to? You used to talk about 17% to 20%. Maybe now it's 10% to 11%. Are we talking about 15%? And can we get there with small bolt ons? Or would you expect to -- can we do something larger and more transformational?

Kelly King

executive
#18

Well, it's a big business for us, has been, continues to be for the reasons we've described. It's very good business and it's excellent in terms of diversification. And if anything out of COVID we've learned and the Great Recession just before, diversification is a big deal. And so we remain very committed to that. I'm very excited that the insurance industry is consolidating at a very rapid pace. We're very excited about our opportunity to grow organically. We are organically growing. Even this year, 4.3%, meaningfully better than the industry, looks maybe like 4% as we head forward into '21. So a very strong organic growth. The acquisitions like we just announced, thanks for mentioning those, are very exciting. They're all great bolt-ons. It's Wellington one in Texas. The most recent is very exciting, it is an insurtech. They've developed a very strong digital capacity to deliver insurance digitally, which we think we can expand beyond their very strong base in Texas to many states across the footprint and even beyond as time goes on. So huge organic and growth opportunities. It's hard to know, Ryan, exactly how the trajectory will be in terms of getting to where we'd like to be. So think about before, we have said that 17% to 20% for BB&T. I don't think it has to be that stronger percentage with the scale of Truist. I think 14%, 15% kind of over long term as being a reasonable target. A lot of that will be organic because we are outgrowing the market materially. There will be a lot of small bolt-ons. Whether they will be the opportunity for something larger, I don't know, but we are a preferred acquirer. John Howard and our insurance team are fantastic, I think, best in the business. And so we have the capital. We have the talent. We have the appetite to be a part of that consolidating industry. And we think that's more likely than not where you would see a meaningful amount of our acquisition activity.

Ryan Nash

analyst
#19

Daryl, Kelly referenced getting capital back to 10%. I think you could be even 10 or 20 basis points above that post the quarter. High level, just what are the capital priorities at this point? What do we need to see to execute on the priorities? And over the longer term, while the bank signal they wanted to get to 10%, what level would you hope to eventually run the capital base for at the company?

Daryl Bible

executive
#20

Yes. So near term, we basically spent our retained earnings this quarter such that we'll probably end up about 10% again at the end of the year. I think it's really up to Kelly and Bill and the Board on if we -- if and when we decide to lower our threshold from 10%. It really depends on the economy and how we're coming out of COVID, coupled with how we're dealing with the conversion. But as things progress, I'm sure there will be some flexibility to basically move the capital ratios down over time, whether you do it through more acquisitions or through share repurchases.

Ryan Nash

analyst
#21

We've got about 30 seconds to go here. And Kelly, given that this may be your last time at the conference and your storied career, I thought it would make sense to ask you the last question, to involve mergers, given how many that you've done. The MOE was clearly transformative for both banks in terms of product offerings and technology. But does the size, scale and time it takes to complete this, does this change your perspective at all on doing deals going forward? And second, while you aren't done with this transaction yet as there's a lot of work remaining, where do you think you need to get in the integrations before you can actually start to think about reentering traditional bank M&A?

Kelly King

executive
#22

Yes. Thanks, Brian, and thanks for all these years of being on your conference. I've enjoyed it. You do one of the best around, you know that. And thank you for that. So yes. So I think that our plate is full right now in terms of doing this. This was a dream merger. I mean I said 10 years ago when I became CEO to the Board and to others, that we wanted to get to be about $500 billion in size. And the first choice will be an MOE, I was very transparent, and didn't know who and where, but everybody needs always a dream merger with BB&T and SunTrust. And so we were just very blessed to be able to see that materialize. As we go forward, we don't really think as much about the next big deal. I don't think -- we have the scale. We are dominant in our markets. And so we can compete with anybody in our markets. And so we don't need a big scale deal to be competitive. And the others that are doing activity today are just kind of where we are. So -- and then the focus rather is on having the scale necessary to be a top-tier provider of client service quality. That's what it's all about. It's not self-evident that 10, 20 years now, it will be more about scale of assets. That's what we think historically about. You may see in the future that the asset isn't the driver of revenue generation. It's much more, I believe, about digital capabilities and other ways of meeting the clients' needs. So we've got to pivot our thinking from what's the next big deal to what's the next digital innovation to meet the clients' needs. What's the next process, like IRM or T3, that allows you to understand the clients' needs and meet them in a very, very proactive way? So you'll see Truist as being very aggressive in terms of meeting our clients' needs. You'll see us being very aggressive in terms of positioning us for a long-term return to our shareholders. That's our goal. And whatever the particular strategy and tactic is will be a result of whatever the conditions that then exist. So thank you. Truist will be top billing on your conference for many, many years. Bill will pick it up next year, and he'll do a great job.

Ryan Nash

analyst
#23

Well, on behalf of myself and all the investors, I want to say thank you for all the participation over the years. And look -- we look forward to having Truist continue to participate hopefully in person next year. Thanks a lot, Kelly. And thank you, Daryl.

Kelly King

executive
#24

Thank you.

Daryl Bible

executive
#25

Thank you.

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