Good afternoon. Welcome to the Civista Bancshares First Quarter 2020 Earnings Call. After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. Please note that this event is being recorded.

Good afternoon. This is Dennis Shaffer, and I would like to thank you for joining us for our first quarter 2020 earnings call. I am joined today by Rich Dutton, SVP of the company and Chief Operating Officer of the bank; Chuck Parcher, SVP of the company and Chief Lending Officer of the bank; and other members of our executive team. Before we begin, I would like to remind you that this conference call contains forward-looking statements with respect to the future performance and financial condition of Civista Bancshares, Inc. that involves risks and uncertainties. Various factors could cause actual results to be materially different from any future results expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. These factors are discussed in the company's SEC filings, which are available on the company's website. The company disclaims any obligation to update any forward-looking statements made during the call. Additionally, management may refer to non-GAAP measures, which are intended to supplement, but not substitute, the most directly comparable GAAP measures. The press release available on the website contains the financial and other quantitative information to be discussed today as well as the reconciliation of the GAAP to non-GAAP measures. We will record this call and make it available on Civista Bancshares' website at www.civb.com. Again, welcome to Civista Bancshares first quarter 2020 earnings call. At the conclusion of my remarks, we will take any questions you may have. Before we get into the results of the quarter, I would like to take a moment to acknowledge the health care providers, first responders, essential workers and everyone on the front lines of this battle we find ourselves in. I would also like to acknowledge the way our Civista team has risen to the challenge by assisting retail and small business customers across our footprint. We began this year expecting one of our biggest challenges would be the uncertain interest rate environment and the pressure it would place on our margin. The COVID-19 pandemic has introduced additional challenges that the banking industry could not have anticipated. Civista is meeting these challenges from a position of excellent asset quality, strong capital levels and a diverse revenue stream. While the length and the depth of economic uncertainty across our footprint and the country is unclear, I am confident in our ability to meet these challenges from a position of strength. This morning, we reported net income of $7.8 million or $0.47 per diluted share. This is a direct result of our strong net interest margin, our continued focus on growing and diversifying noninterest income streams and our disciplined approach in managing the company. Our continued ability to generate core earnings allow our Board of Directors to approve our quarterly dividend during the first quarter of $0.11 per share, which represents a dividend payout ratio of 23%. In these uncertain economic times, it is difficult to predict future performance, but our strong capital and liquidity should allow Civista to maintain this dividend level, unless we experience a further deterioration in the economy for an extended period of time. Our return on average assets was 1.22% for the quarter compared to 1.37% for the linked quarter, and our return on average equity was 9.47% for the quarter compared to 9.44% for the linked quarter. Net interest income increased $893,000 or 4.2% over the linked quarter, and $396,000 or 1.8% year-over-year. Given the changes that were occurring in the interest rate environment, our net interest margin remained strong at 4.10%, compared to 4.18% for the linked quarter and 4.45% year-over-year. The increase in net interest income is a result of an increase in average earning assets, partially offset by a decrease in average yield. Additionally, our cost of interest-bearing liabilities decreased compared to the linked quarter and increased year-over-year. Interest income increased $481,000 or 2% over the linked quarter, and $418,000 or 1.7% year-over-year. During the first quarter, the noninterest-bearing deposits related to our tax refund processing program averaged over $311 million, which allowed us to pay down $84.5 million in FHLB borrowings that were outstanding at year-end. Also included in our margin are 15 basis points of accretion in the quarter compared to 14 basis points for the linked quarter, and 22 basis points year-over-year. As part of our normal ALCO process, we periodically model nonparallel shifts in interest rates. Given the recent drop in the Fed's target rate, we reran those models to see what the impact of a 150 basis point decline in rates might have on our margin. That modeling indicates a 35 basis point contraction in our margin. To put this in perspective, during 2019, the Fed cut their target rate 50 basis points over a 10-month period, and our margin, excluding accretion, contracted 9 basis points. During the quarter, noninterest income increased $1.2 million or 22.2% in comparison to the fourth quarter of 2019, and increased $592,000 or 9.4% year-over-year. One of the largest drivers of the increase is mortgage banking. Our first quarter gains represent a $496,000 or 150% increase over the previous year, as the strong mortgage demand that we saw during the previous quarter continued. During the quarter, we sold $18.9 million more mortgage loans than the first quarter of 2019. The average premium on the sale of loans also increased 34 basis points. Service charge revenue declined by $194,000 or 11.7% compared to our linked quarter, and is comparable to our first quarter of last year. As expected, interchange revenue declined $149,000 or 15.2% compared to the linked quarter with the post-holiday season decline in debit card activity. Our interchange revenue was comparable to our first quarter of last year. Wealth management revenue increased $69,000 or 7.4% compared to the linked quarter, and $159,000 or 18.8% year-over-year, as the assets under management declined by 14.1% to $495.4 million. This was during a period when the S&P 500 index declined 20%. While we continue to view the expansion of these services across our footprint as an opportunity to diversify and grow noninterest income, our fees are primarily based on the value of our clients' portfolios and are impacted by the greater economy. Our income tax refund processing program continues to be an important contributor to our noninterest income and is concentrated in the first and second quarters of each year. Income from that program during the first quarter was $1.9 million. That was a reduction of $300,000 from the prior year, which is in line with what we indicated during our previous call. Swap fees increased $108,000 compared to the linked quarter, and $265,000 year-over-year, as commercial borrowers took advantage of the interest rate environment to lock in lower rates. Noninterest expense increased $728,000 or 4.3% compared to the linked quarter, and $1.4 million or 8.6% year-over-year. In both cases, the increases are primarily the result of increased compensation expense. While our headcount remained stable when comparing linked quarters, it did increase by 22 full-time equivalents or 5% from the first quarter of 2019. Our average merit increases, which occur each year in April, averaged 3% in 2019 and account for $186,000 of the year-over-year increase, and our employee health insurance for 2020 increased by 9%, which accounts for $131,000 of the year-over-year increase. Our efficiency ratio was 60.7%, compared to 62.9% for the linked quarter and 58% year-over-year. Our loan portfolio grew by $34.2 million, or at an annualized rate of 8%, with the majority of the growth coming from both owner and nonowner-occupied commercial real estate and real estate construction loans. While we saw growth in virtually every market, the Cleveland, Columbus and Cincinnati MSAs continue to be strong drivers of our growth. We were pleased with loan production across our footprint during the first quarter. Looking forward to the rest of the year, it will be difficult to project how our loan portfolio will grow until we begin to see some normalization of our market. Our growth and essentially our entire portfolio comes from organic production. We have no exposure to nationally syndicated loans. We like knowing who our customers are and having the ability to work directly with our borrowers should conditions dictate. We believe that we have greatly enhanced our credit underwriting over the last 10 years. Our loan portfolio is diversified throughout our footprint, with none of our operating markets holding more than 25% of our asset. Furthermore, there is no one industry that represents concentration risk. That said, as a percentage of total loans, 7.04% of our portfolio is in guest lodging, 2.01% in restaurants, 2.85% in entertainment and recreation. In a broad sense, 19.03% of our portfolio is in retail, with 4.03% of that mixed retail office, 2.3% mixed retail residential, and the remaining 12.7% being strictly retail. We have no exposure to what we call big-box retail. On the funding side, our deposits increased $313.2 million or 18.7% since the beginning of the year. The primary driver for the increase was deposits related to our tax refund program, which increased $307.5 million during the quarter. As I mentioned in discussing our margin, we manage our wholesale funding in anticipation of the free funding we take in during the tax refund processing season. We used the tax funds to pay down wholesale funding and other short-term borrowings. Our nonperforming loans were $8.6 million at the end of the first quarter compared to $9.1 million at the end of 2019, which represents a 0.33% of total asset. The ratio of our allowance for loan losses to loans increased to 0.97% from year-end, which was 0.86%. While our allowance for loan losses to nonperforming loans also increased to 197.97% at the end of the first quarter from 161.95% at the end of 2019. While these reflect very strong credit metrics by historical standards, given the uncertain nature of our current economy, we will continue to monitor our portfolio and the economy and make further adjustments as our model dictates in future quarters. Given the uncertainty currently being driven by COVID-19 and its impact on the economy, we did make adjustments to qualitative factors in our allowance for loan loss model. As a result, we recorded a $2.1 million provision expense for the quarter. We were fortunate to meet the guidelines for the delayed implementation of CECL and we will not be required to adopt it until 2023. We did repurchase 646,703 shares of our common stock during the quarter for $11 million, ending the quarter with a tangible common equity ratio of 9.82% compared to 11.08% at December 31, 2019. The extra $311 million of liquidity that our income tax refund processing business generated during the quarter reduced our tangible common equity ratio by 1.4%. The statement is often made that capital is king. We have performed some stress tests on our capital and feel that we are in a strong position. In spite of the challenges of our current environment, we are pleased with another quarter fueled by solid core earnings. The COVID-19 pandemic has had a rippling effect across the nationwide economy. In Ohio, though, we are currently in a stay at home order until at least May 1. Many of our employees have been working in either split operations or from home, and our branches have been at a drive-up-only status for some time. At Civista, we have a long history of working with our customers in good times and in challenging times. That philosophy has served us well over time and is still prevalent today. We have been assisting our customers through payment deferrals, SBA PPP loans and other accommodations. To date, we have 432 loans totaling $262 million that have been modified as part of our COVID-19 relief effort. Nearly 90% of those loans are receiving a 90-day deferral of both principal and interest. All these deferrals meet the requirements to not be treated as troubled debt restructurings. Through the first round of the SBA payment protection program, we processed and received approval for 1,271 loans, totaling nearly $187 million. While this will provide us with approximately $7 million in fee income, the more important statistic is that it allows approximately 26,500 employees to keep their jobs. We will continue to prudently work with our customers to help them where we can. We feel that is part of being a community bank. As the slogan says, we are all in this together. While the next few months will undoubtedly test the banking industry and the larger business world, Civista is entering this period with excellent asset quality, strong capital levels and a diverse revenue stream. Thank you for your attention this afternoon, and now we'll be happy to address any questions that you may have.

Our first question is from Nick Cucharale from Piper Sandler.

So I wanted to start with the loan modifications here. I appreciate the additional disclosure this quarter. More of a clarification, there's obviously a lot of uncertainty given that pandemic. But of the $411 million in deferral request since March 31, is it your expectation that substantially all of these requests are granted?

Yes, we have decided to give most of our customers a 90-day period to operate without restrictions, and we will review their situation at the end of that period to determine our next steps. We are fully prepared to implement this plan.

Nick, it's Rich. The only thing I'd add to that is that they have to be current in order for us to do that.

And all of the ones we have modified to date have been current.

Yes. Okay. Great. And then secondly, on the noninterest-bearing deposits, they got the typical boost from the tax business, as you mentioned. Just looking at the end-of-period numbers, that looks to be about $308 million this quarter versus $189 million in the first quarter of '19, is this a structural change in the business or more of just a timing issue?

I don't see a significant change in this tax season compared to the last one. Taxpayers are taking advantage of that program, and both filed early once the funds were available. With the extension of the tax season to July, it shouldn't have much impact on our cash flow from that program.

I appreciate the information. Regarding the NIM, what was the time period for the 35 basis points of contraction you mentioned?

Nick, this is Rich. And what we did as we went back and looked at where we were sitting in the first quarter, we said, okay, let's take a 150 basis points contraction in the lowest and do the nonparallel shift, and that came in again at about a 35 basis point contraction. And that would be, if at all, happened at once and instantaneous.

Okay. And then the accretion income has been relatively steady since you changed your modeling assumptions a few quarters ago, how are you thinking about the NIM in the coming quarters?

Again, I think for the balance of this year, at 15 basis points a quarter is probably what we expect. And again, the only wildcard would be prepayments. But again, I think it's been 14, 15 basis points for the last 2 or 3 quarters, and that's kind of what we see over the next 2 or 3, for sure.

Okay. But referring to the core margin, what is your outlook for that?

Okay. I'm sorry, I answered the wrong question. But I did a pretty good job.

You did. You did.

So if we ended the quarter at, I need to refer to a different page.

I'm sorry, I answered the wrong question. But I did a pretty good job.

Yes. So if it was 4.10 for the quarter, I think over the balance of the year, something approaching 30 basis points of contraction is not out of the realm.

Okay. And that's point-to-point from the first quarter to the fourth quarter, you're saying?

Correct. Yes. Yes.

Okay. Great. And then lastly, and then I'll jump out. I see you were pretty active on the buyback this quarter and exhausted the repurchase program shortly after quarter end. Is it your expectation that you'll re-up the authorization? Or is it more of a wait-and-see approach?

We expect to renew the authorization. However, I anticipate there will be a suspension for a while as we work to gain a clearer understanding of our overall credit portfolio. We want to feel more confident and have a better grasp of the economic situation. With ongoing business shutdowns, the duration of this uncertainty and the effects of relief programs are unknown. So while I do expect us to renew the authorization, there will likely be a pause until we achieve that comfort level regarding both the economy and the credits in our portfolio.

Our next question is from Michael Perito from KBW.

Thanks for the time this quarter with always the extra disclosures. I did want to ask on the credit side. The hotel and restaurant exposure that you outlined, Dennis, how much of that is going to be in deferral by your estimation in the next week or so? I mean, is it a majority? Or how does that look at this point?

I'll let Chuck answer, but I would assume it would...

I would say that it is the majority. While I don't have an exact percentage, it certainly appears to be the majority as I review the list.

And are you guys making any assumptions at this point? Or any specific reserves against that portfolio as it seems to be kind of particularly stressed, even if there's some type of recovery? I mean, there's still kind of questions as to how fast those guys will be able to return to some type of normal operating period. What are you guys thinking at this point in that regard?

Yes, Paul Stark's on the line, and I'll have Paul give his thoughts and I've got a couple of thoughts. But go ahead, Paul.

Yes, I believe it’s too early to determine. Some of this will rely on the financial reserves that the sponsors possess to maintain progress. Our expectation is that the build-back period may take a bit longer. We ran a few different scenarios but, for now, given the deferrals and cash being allocated, we opted to increase our Q factors instead of making specific allocations. As we gather more information over the next 90 days, we will be in a better position to make those allocations.

Mike, most of our provision expense was really just an adjustment of the qualitative factors surrounding the economy itself. As Paul mentioned, I believe we will gain a bit more clarity as we move forward and observe what opens up and what doesn't.

Okay. So the majority of the reserve build in the first quarter was really a general reserve build? What were some of the economic assumptions made to drive those qualitative changes?

Some of the businesses have no income, and they are facing additional expenses related to COVID-19. The unemployment rate is very high, and there have been numerous requests for payment deferrals or relief. These were the main factors contributing to the situation.

As well as lack of personal travel because of closing down and people being homebound.

Right.

Are you able to share some of the GDP and unemployment assumptions that you use in making your reserve trajectory decisions? We're trying to compare how it aligns with ours.

I can tell you that these are general allocations based on overall numbers. We have some localized information, but I don't think it's that precise given the significant influx. Many of these individuals went from standard revenue during good years to experiencing a considerable drop, with a lot of restaurants seeing no revenue. Therefore, I don't think we have our usual pattern. When assessing the risk and how stressed these individuals might be, we decided it was better to estimate on the conservative side. Typically, if you look back at unemployment and the losses from that in past normal scenarios, it’s quite predictable. Unfortunately, given the current situation, it's much harder to determine. It was challenging to navigate this, and I don’t believe we can clearly articulate it. It's more of an estimate.

Yes. The reserve build was about eight times what it was a year ago. There was a lot of uncertainty about where that number should be. However, we felt it was appropriate for the first quarter, considering that the stay-at-home orders had only been in effect for two to three weeks.

Yes, that's a fair point. Moving on, I have one last question regarding expenses. What are your thoughts, Dennis or Rich, on near-term expenses? I suspect there are some elevated personnel costs, especially due to the pressure the PPP lending is putting on the franchise. Can you share your insights on the expected expense trajectory for the second quarter? I'll leave it at that.

Yes, Mike, this is Rich. If our noninterest expense for the first quarter was about $17.8 million, keep in mind that we typically implement merit increases on April 1. You can factor in an additional $200,000 for that, bringing the total to $18 million. That's the most certain information I have. We are also experiencing some increased expenses due to COVID, but we are seeing reductions in other areas since traveling and lodging are minimal right now. We have modeled expenses to be somewhere between $18 million and $18.4 million. However, I want to emphasize that there is a lot of uncertainty in these projections, and that reflects our current situation.

Mike, regarding the PPP loans, we didn't really incur significant additional expenses to process them. We utilized staff from our retail sector since we had closed some branches and drew from various business lines. As a result, we didn't see a substantial increase in expenses due to the PPP loans. Our mortgage volume has increased considerably, prompting us to hire additional processors in the last year. You will notice the full impact of this moving forward, but our mortgage volume is now nearly double what it was before.

I was going to say, once we find out what the exact forgiveness rules are, there probably will be some small incremental expense because people will be working on the loan portfolio, but that should be covered by the revenue that we're taking in from PPP.

Our next question is from Russell Gunther from D.A. Davidson.

I just wanted to follow up on your comments about the internal stress tests you've been conducting. You mentioned that it gives you comfort in the capital position, which certainly seems above expectations. Could you share some of the related assumptions you're using and perhaps what you consider or model regarding potential stress loss rates within the hotel and restaurant segments?

During our capital plan stress test, we reviewed the last recession and noted that we incurred approximately $54 million in losses over a four-year period. We then doubled that figure and assumed we would continue paying a dividend and experience some loan growth, condensing the analysis to a two-year timeframe. This approach demonstrated that we could maintain a Tier 1 capital level above 8%, allowing for losses of about $110 million while still remaining above the 8% threshold. This is double the losses we faced in the previous recession but over a shorter duration, without implementing typical measures such as slowing loan growth, furloughing employees, or ceasing dividends. We assumed those factors remained unchanged. Of course, if losses accumulate, there are measures we could take, but overall, we felt quite confident about our position.

I appreciate the comments there, guys. And then kind of a ticky-tacky question, but the loan loss reserve is at 97 basis points today, if you consider marks taken in prior deals, is there much of a lift to that? Where would that number stand?

The credit mark from our last acquisition approximately 18 months ago is about 17 basis points. Paul, do you have anything you would like to add on that?

Well, if we're talking about the future, we don't know yet. We are currently in the process of assessing things on a credit-by-credit basis, and it's likely that everyone will be affected differently. If we find that this situation extends for a longer period, I'm unsure what the definition of temporary is anymore. Essentially, as we look ahead, we may need to increase that depending on what we observe.

Yes. The credit mark on the last acquisition was approximately 17 basis points, which brings us to around 114 with the 97. We anticipate that the provision may remain elevated in the future, but at the current elevated level, it is uncertain what will happen next due to the overall unpredictability.

Understood. And then last question I had, guys, is there much in the way of overlap between the roughly $400 million of deferrals and the $187 million of PPP?

Yes. This is Chuck, Russell. I would say that most of it is probably overlapping, to be honest. We focused on our customer-first model with the PPP program, so we managed to serve nearly all our clients who requested it in the first wave. While I don't have a complete cross-reference, I believe it's quite close that most of the people who took deferrals also took the PPP loan.

Our next question is from Kevin Swanson from Hovde Group.

Most of my questions are answered, I just want to throw one more out there. Obviously, prior to COVID, you guys had a nice growth plan, it was working well. Obviously, right now, the stance has kind of changed a little bit to sustaining businesses and helping the community. But how do you think about positioning for offense as the tide starts to turn?

This is Chuck, Kevin. It has been interesting to observe the PPP program. We have been successful in implementing it, and as a result, we are beginning to see a positive demand for loans and establish strong customer relationships by outperforming regional and national competitors. Even as we anticipate the next phase, more customers are reaching out to us for implementation compared to their usual banks. Additionally, I feel optimistic looking ahead because the CMBS market appears somewhat unsettled, with loan-to-value ratios being reduced. We are noticing some of our very successful projects, which might have previously entered that market, are now approaching us for 10-year swap financing, keeping them on our balance sheet. This should support our growth for the remainder of the year. While it's challenging to predict total demand over the next 90 days as we transition to the post-COVID landscape, I remain hopeful for continued growth.

Okay. Great. And maybe just a follow-up to that. Obviously, I appreciate some of the uncertainties that remain. Have you thought about any changes to credit structure and underwriting, given what we've learned so far from the impact? And maybe on some of the growth that you guys are seeing?

We have discussed this in detail, and I’ll let Paul share his insights as well. Clearly, we are not planning to enter the hotel market in the near future. Paul, could you elaborate on our future plans?

I think the immediate need is to really evaluate each deal as it comes in. The biggest issue is understanding the impact of these projects or customers, their liquidity, and whether they have a plan and strategy to navigate the current situation. Many customers have not been significantly affected, but there are some projects that initially expected a more normalized environment. Therefore, we have been very cautious in approaching these situations. In terms of wholesale underwriting changes, I don't believe we've made any; it's really about focusing on each deal at this point.

Just to reiterate what Chuck said, too, the hotels, restaurants, those would all be tough deals we wouldn't be looking at today.

Yes. The one thing that was interesting through this, Kevin, I know some other banks have seen different results, we have not seen really any excessive draws on any of our lines of credit. Nobody has come in, in any type of panic and tried to draw our commercial lines up or our home equity lines up. Those balances have been pretty flat from the start of this announcement of the pandemic.

Our next question is from Scott Beury from Boenning and Scattergood.

All the detail regarding your COVID-related programs, and most of my questions have already been answered, I just was curious to kind of see if you had any guidance regarding the tax rate? I know that it dipped down a little bit this quarter below kind of your prior guidance, but I just wanted to see what the impact would be there regarding the CARES Act and what you expect going forward?

Sure, Scott. This is Rich. And really, I don't know that the CARES Act had a whole lot of bearing on our effective rate. It was a whole lot more to do with the elevated provision and then the percentage of kind of tax preference revenue that we generate regularly. So I think going forward, we've been kind of running at about a 16% effective tax rate. Todd and Mike and I have been talking about it. And given what we think we're going to do for the rest of the year, probably 16% is the high end of what we would guide you to, but probably a 14% or 15% effective rate is probably not a bad rate. And I'd have lost money if you'd asked me that a quarter ago.

This concludes our question-and-answer session. I would now like to turn the conference back to Dennis Shaffer for closing remarks.

Thank you. Well, in closing, I just want to thank everyone for listening in, thank those who participated on the call. Again, we are very pleased with our first quarter results. The balance of 2020 will likely be a challenge. We know that. We do look forward to meeting those challenges and to talking to you again in a few months to share our second quarter results. So thank you for your time today.

The conference has now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect.