Comerica Incorporated (NYSE:CMA) Q2 2024 Earnings Conference Call July 19, 2024 8:00 AM ET

Company Participants

Kelly Gage - Director, Investor Relations
Curt Farmer - President, Chairman & Chief Executive Officer
Jim Herzog - Chief Financial Officer
Peter Sefzik - Chief Banking Officer
Melinda Chausse - Chief Credit Officer

Conference Call Participants

Ken Usdin - Jefferies
Chris McGratty - KBW
Bernard Von Gizycki - Deutsche Bank
Mike Mayo - Wells Fargo
Manan Gosalia - Morgan Stanley
Samuel Varga - UBS

Operator

Hello, and welcome to the Comerica Second Quarter 2024 Earnings Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] As a reminder, this conference is being recorded.

It's now my pleasure to turn the call over to Kelly Gage, Director of Investor Relations. Please go ahead, Kelly.

Kelly Gage

Thanks, Kevin. Good morning, and welcome to Comerica's second quarter 2024 earnings conference call.

Participating on this call will be our President, Chairman and CEO, Curt Farmer; Chief Financial Officer, Jim Herzog; Chief Credit Officer, Melinda Chausse; and Chief Banking Officer, Peter Sefzik.

During this presentation, we will be referring to slides, which provide additional details. The presentation slides and our press release are available on the SEC's website as well as on the Investor Relations section of our website, comerica.com.

The presentation and this conference call contain forward-looking statements. In that regard, you should be mindful of the risks and uncertainties that can cause actual results to vary materially from expectations. Forward-looking statements speak only as of the date of this presentation, and we undertake no obligation to update any forward-looking statements. Please refer to the Safe Harbor statement in today's earnings presentation on Slide 2.

Also, the presentation and this conference call will reference non-GAAP measures. In that regard, I direct you to the reconciliation of these measures in the earnings materials that are available on our website, comerica.com.

Now, I'll turn the call over to Curt, who will begin on Slide 3.

Curt Farmer

Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining our call.

Today, we reported second quarter earnings of $206 million, or $1.49 per share, outperforming the first quarter on both the reported and on an adjusted basis. Although average loans declined, our targeted focus on responsible growth drove an inflection in balances throughout the quarter.

In an uncertain economic and political environment, customer sentiment appeared slightly less optimistic than last quarter. However, a number of our businesses saw positive momentum and we believe our pipeline supports our growth outlook.