Columbia Banking System, Inc. (NASDAQ:COLB) Q2 2024 Earnings Conference Call July 25, 2024 5:00 PM ET

Company Participants

Jackie Bohlen - Investor Relations Director
Clint Stein - President and Chief Executive Officer
Ronald Farnsworth - Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer
Frank Namdar - Executive Vice President and Chief Credit Officer
Torran Nixon - President, Commercial Banking of Umpqua Bank
Christopher Merrywell - President, Consumer Banking of Umpqua Bank

Conference Call Participants

Jon Arfstrom - RBC Capital Markets
Matthew Clark - Piper Sandler
David Feaster - Raymond James
Brandon King - Truist
Jared Shaw - Barclays
Jeffrey Rulis - D.A. Davidson
Chris McGrady - KW

Operator

Welcome to the Columbia Banking Systems Second Quarter 2024 Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speakers' presentation, there will be a question-and-answer session. [Operator instructions] Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded.

I would like to introduce Jackie Bohlen, Investor Relations Director, to begin the conference call. Please go ahead.

Jackie Bohlen

Thank you, Lisa and good afternoon everyone. Thank you for joining us as we review our second quarter results. The earnings release and corresponding presentation are available on our website at columbiabankingsystem.com.

During today's call, we will make forward-looking statements, which are subject to risks and uncertainties and are intended to be covered by the Safe Harbor provisions of Federal Securities Law. For a list of factors that may cause actual results to differ materially from expectations, please refer to the disclosures contained within our SEC filings. We will also reference non-GAAP financial measures and encourage you to review the non-GAAP reconciliations provided in our earnings materials.

I will now hand the call over to Columbia's President and CEO, Clint Stein.

Clint Stein

Thank you, Jackie. Good afternoon everyone. We made considerable progress over the past three months on the initiatives we discussed in April. We enacted changes to the way we evaluate and approve deposit pricing, which resulted in increased stabilization in the cost of customer deposits. We also achieved more expense reductions during the quarter than what we anticipated and communicated to you in April.

When we spoke last quarter, I outlined the realization of $43 million in annualized net cost reductions from the operational effectiveness work that began during the first quarter. This work is the result of identifying opportunities for improvement after observing a year of the combined company's operations.