Western Alliance Bancorporation (NYSE:WAL) Q2 2022 Earnings Conference Call July 22, 2022 12:00 PM ET

CompanyParticipants

Miles Pondelik - Director of Investor Relations & Corporate Development

Ken Vecchione - Chief Executive Officer

Dale Gibbons - Executive Vice President & Chief Financial Officer

Timothy Bruckner - Chief Credit Officer

Conference Call Participants

Casey Haire - Jefferies

Ebrahim Poonawala - Bank of America

Brad Milsaps - Piper Sandler

Timur Braziler - Wells Fargo

Chris McGratty - KBW

Brandon King - Truist Securities

Gary Tenner - D.A. Davidson

Jon Arfstrom - RBC Capital Markets

Operator

Good day, everyone. Welcome to Western Alliance Bancorporation's Second Quarter 2022 Earnings Call. You may also view the presentation today via webcast through the company's website at www.westernalliancebancorporation.com.

I would now like to turn today's call over to Miles Pondelik, Director of Investor Relations and Corporate Development. Please go ahead, sir.

Miles Pondelik

Thank you and welcome to Western Alliance Bank's second quarter 2022 conference call. Our speakers today are Ken Vecchione, President and Chief Executive Officer; Dale Gibbons, Chief Financial Officer; and Tim Bruckner, our Chief Credit Officer.

Before I hand the call over to Ken, please note that today's presentation contains forward-looking statements which are subject to risks, uncertainties and assumptions. Except as preprimary law, the company does not undertake any obligation to update any forward-looking statements. For more complete discussion of the risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from any forward-looking statements, please refer to the company's SEC filings through the Form 8-K filed yesterday which are available on the company's website.

Now for opening remarks, I'd like to turn the call over to Ken Vecchione.

Ken Vecchione

Thanks, Miles. We had solid performance this quarter as the company passed the $66 billion asset milestone and the strong earnings power of our diversified asset sensitive business model was on display even as we are keenly focused on the economic uncertainty around us.

For the second quarter, WAL generated total net revenues of $620 million, net income of $260 million and EPS of $2.39. Record earnings were propelled by accelerating net interest income quarterly growth of $75 million, or 17% from prior quarter to $525 million as the rising rate environment expanded our net interest margin 22 basis points to 3.54%.

Interest income rose 3x faster than interest expenses, inclusive of deposit costs and ECRs. We maintained industry-leading performance with return on average assets and return on average tangible common equity of 1.62% and 25.6%, respectively which will continue to support capital accumulation and strong capital levels in the quarters to come.