KeyCorp (NYSE:KEY) Q4 2023 Results Conference Call January 18, 2024 9:00 AM ET

Company Participants

Chris Gorman - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Clark Khayat - Chief Financial Officer

Vernon Patterson - Executive Vice President, Investor Relations

Conference Call Participants

Peter Winter - D.A. Davidson

Scott Siefers - Piper Sandler

John Pancari - Evercore ISI

Manan Gosalia - Morgan Stanley

Erika Najarian - UBS

Matt O'Connor - Deutsche Bank

Gerard Cassidy - RBC Capital Markets

Mike Mayo - Wells Fargo Securities

Steven Alexopoulos - JPMorgan

Ken Usdin - Jefferies

Bill Carcache - Wolfe Research, LLC

Operator

[Call Starts Abruptly] 2023 Fourth Quarter Earnings Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. Later, we will conduct a question-and-answer session. [Operator Instructions] As a reminder, this conference is being recorded.

I would now like to turn the conference over to Chris Gorman, KeyCorp's Chairman and CEO. Please go ahead.

Chris Gorman

Thank you for joining us for KeyCorp's fourth quarter 2023 earnings conference call. Joining me on the call today are Clark Khayat, our Chief Financial Officer; and our Chief Risk Officer, Darrin Benhart, who succeeded Mark Midkiff at the beginning of this year. On Slide 2, you will find our statement on forward-looking disclosure and certain financial measures, including non-GAAP measures. These statements cover our presentation materials and comments as well as the question-and-answer segment of our call.

I am now moving to Slide 3. This morning, we reported earnings of $30 million or $0.03 per share. Our results included $209 million of after-tax expenses or $0.22 per share from three items that Clark will describe in more detail later.

For the year, we reported EPS of $0.88 including $0.27 impact from similar types of expenses. Fourth quarter closes out a challenging year for the industry and for Key. While our business fundamentals remain solid throughout the year, we acknowledge that our balance sheet coming into the year was not well positioned for the rapid rise in interest rates that transpired. We took a number of necessary steps as we move through the year to enhance our balance sheet liquidity and capital position, in preparation for potential changes in capital rules, positioning ourselves to be a simpler, smaller, more profitable bank. These actions also had some near-term financial impacts.

As a result, we missed our own expectations and yours. However, as we turn the page to 2024, I think it is really important to step back and recognize that Key accomplished a number of positive things last year and as a result, I am confident we have laid the groundwork as we move forward.