First Financial Bancorp. (NASDAQ:FFBC) Q3 2024 Earnings Conference Call October 25, 2024 8:30 AM ET

Company Participants

Scott Crawley - Corporate Controller
Archie Brown - President and Chief Executive Officer
Jamie Anderson - Chief Financial Officer
Bill Harrod - Chief Credit Officer

Conference Call Participants

Daniel Tamayo - Raymond James
Terry McEvoy - Stephens
Andrew Leischner - KBW

Operator

Thank you for standing by. My name is Jeannie, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the First Financial Bancorp Third Quarter 2024 Earnings Conference Call and Webcast. [Operator Instructions]

I would now like to turn the conference over to Scott Crawley. You may begin.

Scott Crawley

Yes. Good morning. Thank you, Jeannie. Good morning, everybody, and thank you for joining us on today's conference call to discuss First Financial Bancorp's third quarter and year-to-date financial results.

Participating on today's call will be Archie Brown, President and Chief Executive Officer; Jamie Anderson, Chief Financial Officer; and Bill Harrod, Chief Credit Officer.

Both the press release we issued yesterday and the accompanying slide presentation are available on our website at www.bankatfirst.com under the Investor Relations section. We'll make reference to the slides contained in the accompanying presentation during today's call. Additionally, please refer to the forward-looking statement disclosure contained in the third quarter 2024 earnings release as well as our SEC filings for a full discussion of the company's risk factors. The information we will provide today is accurate as of September 30, 2024, and we will not be updating any forward-looking statements to reflect facts or circumstances after this call.

I'll now turn the call over to Archie Brown.

Archie Brown

Thanks, Scott. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us on today's call.

Yesterday afternoon, we announced our financial results for the third quarter. I'll provide some highlights this morning and then turn the call over to Jamie to provide further details. The third quarter financial results reflect our ongoing commitment to driving industry-leading performance.

Adjusted earnings per share was $0.67, which resulted in a return on assets of 1.42% and return on tangible common equity of 19.77%. We're particularly pleased with our 4.08% net interest margin with only a 2 basis point decline from the second quarter. The margin has proven to be more durable than expected due to high asset yields from Agile investment portfolio restructuring and moderating funding costs.