Market Reaction
Despite the earnings beat, Ameris Bancorp (NYSE:ABCB)'s stock showed limited movement in after-hours trading, closing at $65.65, a marginal increase from its last close of $65.57. The stock has demonstrated strong momentum with a 35.8% return over the past year. According to InvestingPro analysis, the stock appears undervalued based on its Fair Value calculation, presenting a potential opportunity for investors. The stock trades at an attractive P/E ratio of 12.6x and remains within its 52-week range of $44.23 to $74.56, suggesting room for growth while maintaining steady investor sentiment.
Key Takeaways
- Ameris Bancorp's Q4 2024 EPS of $1.38 surpassed the forecast by 17%.
- Revenue for the quarter exceeded expectations by approximately 5.3%.
- The company reported a 26% year-over-year increase in adjusted EPS.
- A quarterly dividend increase of 33% was announced, from $0.15 to $0.20 per share.
- Strong capital position with a Common Equity Tier 1 ratio of 12.6%.
Company Performance
Ameris Bancorp demonstrated strong performance in the fourth quarter of 2024, with significant growth in net income and earnings per share. The company's strategic initiatives, including hiring new commercial bankers and enhancing loan production, have paid off, resulting in the highest loan production in two years. The company also made strides in reducing broker deposits while growing core deposits, indicating a solid operational strategy.
Financial Highlights
- Revenue: $290.78 million, surpassing the forecast of $276.17 million.
- Earnings per share: $1.38, exceeding the expected $1.18.
- Full-year net income: $358.7 million, translating to $5.19 per diluted share.
- Adjusted return on assets (ROA): 1.33%.
- Adjusted return on tangible common equity (ROTCE): 13.93%.
Earnings vs. Forecast
Ameris Bancorp's actual EPS of $1.38 exceeded the forecast of $1.18, representing a positive surprise of approximately 17%. The revenue also surpassed expectations, coming in at $290.78 million compared to the forecasted $276.17 million. This marks a strong performance relative to previous quarters, highlighting the company's ability to effectively manage its operations and capitalize on market opportunities.
Market Reaction
Despite the earnings beat, Ameris Bancorp's stock showed limited movement in after-hours trading, closing at $65.65, a marginal increase from its last close of $65.57. This stability in the stock price may reflect investor confidence in the company's long-term strategy and financial health. The stock remains within its 52-week range, suggesting steady investor sentiment.
Outlook & Guidance
Looking ahead, Ameris Bancorp has set ambitious targets, including a 5% to 7% increase in fee income and expense growth between 4.5% and 5%. The company expects its net interest margin to stabilize around 3.50% to 3.55%. With a focus on organic growth and selective mergers and acquisitions, Ameris Bancorp is well-positioned for continued success in 2025.
Executive Commentary
Palmer Proctor, CEO of Ameris Bancorp, emphasized the company's readiness to maintain or accelerate growth, stating, "We're positioned to accelerate it or to maintain what we've got." CFO Nicole Stokes highlighted the company's margin accretive strategies, noting, "Everything that we're putting on is margin accretive."
Risks and Challenges
- Interest Rate Fluctuations: Changes in interest rates could impact loan yields and deposit costs.
- Economic Uncertainty: Macroeconomic pressures may affect consumer confidence and spending.
- Regulatory Changes: Potential regulatory shifts could alter the banking landscape.
- Competition: Increased competition in the Southeastern markets could pressure margins.
Q&A
During the earnings call, analysts inquired about the company's margin expansion strategy, which is driven by public fund deposits and deposit repricing. Questions also focused on the expected impact of Federal Reserve rate cuts on loan yields and the company's approach to managing deposit costs, which have decreased from 2.75% to 2.40% quarter-over-quarter.
Full transcript - Ameris Bancorp (ABCB) Q4 2024:
Wyatt, Conference Call Moderator: Good day, and welcome to the Ameris Bancorp Fourth Quarter Conference Call. All participants will be in listen only mode. After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. Please note this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Nicole Stokes, Chief Financial Officer.
Please go ahead.
Nicole Stokes, Chief Financial Officer, Ameris Bancorp: Thank you, Wyatt, and thank you to all who have joined our call today. During the call, we will be referencing the press release and the financial highlights that are available on the Investor Relations section of our website atamerisbank.com. I'm joined today by Palmer Proctor, our CEO and Doug Strange, our Chief Credit Officer. Palmer will begin with some opening general comments and then I will discuss the details of our financial results before we open up for Q and A. Before we begin, I'll remind you that our comments may include forward looking statements.
These statements are subject to risks and uncertainties. The actual results could vary materially. We list some of the factors that might cause results to differ in our press release and in our SEC filings, which are available on our website. We do not assume any obligation to update any forward looking statement as a result of new information, early developments or otherwise, except as required by law. Also during the call, we will discuss certain non GAAP financial measures in reference to the company's performance.
You can see our reconciliation of these measures and GAAP financial measures in the appendix to our presentation. And with that, I'll turn it over to Palmer.
Palmer Proctor, CEO, Ameris Bancorp: Thank you, Nicole, and good morning, everyone. I appreciate you taking the time to join the call. I'm very pleased with our top tier 4th quarter financial performance, which we reported yesterday, as well as our exceptional full year 2024 results. Before diving into the Q4 performance, I'd like to emphasize our full year 2024 achievements, reflecting on both our core profitability and strong balance sheet management, which positions us well for 2025. This year, we grew earnings per share notably, saw our adjusted ROA increase to north of $1.30, built our reserve and strengthened our capital base with our tangible common equity ratio now well over 10%, up almost 100 basis points over 2023.
We also grew deposits by 5%, while reducing broker deposits. For the Q4, our profitability remained robust with an adjusted ROA of 1.43 above peer PPNR ROA of over 2% and a return on tangible common equity over 14%. Our 4th quarter margin was 3.64 with our net interest income continuing to increase. This strong margin result from our granular core deposit base and 30% DDA composition. Expense control remains intact as our adjusted efficiency ratio improved over 2.40 basis points this quarter to under 52%.
We continue to focus on maximizing earnings per share through effective balance sheet management. We grew revenue almost 10% annualized creating positive operating leverage. We maintained our average earning assets strategically, reduced our CRE and construction concentrations and lowered our loan to deposit ratio, all while growing margin in this rate environment. Organic capital generation remains a strength with common equity Tier 1 at 12.6 percent, thereby giving us optionality going forward to execute strategies within our high growth Southeastern footprint. Our allowance for credit losses ended the year at a healthy 1.63 we remain focused on growing tangible book value per share as evidenced by our 14.7% growth for the year.
As we head into 2025, our strategic focus remains on maintaining top tier profitability, enhancing revenue generation and positive operating leverage, sustaining a strong capital position and leveraging growth opportunities within our dynamic footprint. The outlook is bright as we head into 2025 and we appreciate the continued support of all of our stakeholders. And I'll stop there and I'll turn it over to Nicole to discuss our financial results in more detail.
Nicole Stokes, Chief Financial Officer, Ameris Bancorp: Thank you, Palmer. For the Q4, we reported net income of $94,400,000 or $1.37 per diluted share. We did incur a few onetime in nature items in the quarter, but excluding those small items, our adjusted net income was $95,100,000 or $1.38 per diluted share. For the full year 2024, we reported net income of $358,700,000 or $5.19 per diluted share. On an adjusted basis, net income was $346,600,000 or $5.02 per diluted share.
That's about a 26% increase in year over year adjusted EPS. Our full year adjusted ROA was a $1.33 and our full year adjusted ROTCE was 13.93 dollars both of which improved from our 2023 levels. And our PP and R ROA remained strong at $205 for the year. We continue to build capital in 2024 with ending tangible book value of $38.59 per share, which is a $4.95 or 14.7 percent increase from the $33.64 at the end of last year. The 4th quarter increase alone was $1.08 and also we increased our quarterly dividend 33% from $0.15 a share to $0.20 a share this quarter.
Our tangible common equity ratio increased to 10.59 at the end of the quarter compared to 10.24 at the end of last quarter and 9.64 at the end of last year. We did not repurchase any stock this quarter, but we did repurchase about $5,000,000 in the full year of 2024 and our $100,000,000 buyback authorization remains in place through October of 'twenty five. Our net interest income increased $7,700,000 this quarter. Our margin expanded 13 basis points to 3.64 from 3.51 last quarter. This expansion partially came from an inflow of public fund deposits that we used to reduce higher cost wholesale funding.
That dynamic will be reversed when those public funds seasonally decline in the first half of the year. And also with the recent Fed cut rates, we've had great success lowering our deposit costs more than the decline in our loan yields, which benefited the margin. We continue to be close to neutral on asset liability sensitivity. On the capital side, during the quarter, we redeemed $105,800,000 of sub debt. This redemption is going to save us about 1 to 2 basis points of margin in 2025 versus if we had kept it because the rate reset would have been about 300 basis points higher.
Even with this redemption, our total risk based capital was strong at 15.4%, which was about 90 basis points higher than it was last year. During the Q4, we recorded a $12,800,000 provision for credit losses, increasing our coverage ratio to 1 0.63% of loans and improving to 3 13 percent of portfolio NPLs. Our total non performing assets as a percentage of assets remain low at 47 basis points and our charge offs were stable again this quarter at 17 basis points compared to 15 basis points last quarter and for the year we were at 19 basis points. Adjusted non interest income increased $4,000,000 this quarter mostly in the gains on sale of SBA (LON:SBA) loans. Within our mortgage division, both mortgage volumes and our gain on sale grew in the quarter and our gain on sale rebounded to 2.40 from 2.17 last quarter.
We did a great job controlling expenses in the quarter. When you look at it, our adjusted total revenue increased 9.8% annualized, while our expenses shrank 1.9 percent giving us positive operating leverage where our adjusted efficiency ratio improved to 51.82 percent for the quarter. There was about a $700,000 decrease in adjusted non expense and it mostly came from lower data processing, advertising and marketing spend. For the year, our adjusted efficiency ratio was 53.88, well within our targeted 52% to 55% range. On the balance sheet side, we ended the quarter with total assets of $26,300,000,000 compared with $25,200,000,000 at the end of last year, and our average earning assets were up to $24,400,000,000 up from $23,200,000,000 a year ago.
Loan balances declined slightly during the quarter reflecting the seasonality in our mortgage warehouse and premium finance businesses as well as accelerated average pay downs in our CRE book. However, the average balance of total loans during the quarter was roughly stable as higher loans held for sale offset the slightly down portfolio loans. Total (EPA:TTEF) loan production in the 4th quarter was $1,800,000,000 the highest we've seen in the past 2 years and many of these loans will fund in future quarters. We strategically reduced our broker deposits by about $832,000,000 and grew to core deposits by $675,000,000 or over 3% during the quarter. That growth included about $550,000,000 of our cyclical municipal deposits that will run back out during early 2025.
For the year 2024, deposits increased about $1,000,000,000 or almost 5%, while we reduced broker deposits by $340,000,000 Our non interest bearing deposits still represent a healthy 30% of total deposits and our brokered CDs represent less than 5% of total deposits. We continue to anticipate 2025 loan and deposit growth in the mid single digit and expect that deposit growth will continue to be the governor on loan growth. I just want to close by reiterating how well positioned we are and how focused we are on a successful 2025. And with that, I'm going to wrap the call back over to Wyatt for any questions from the group. Thank you, Wyatt.
Wyatt, Conference Call Moderator: And our first question will come from Catherine Mealor with KBW. Please go ahead.
Catherine Mealor, Analyst, KBW: Thanks. Good morning.
Doug Strange, Chief Credit Officer, Ameris Bancorp: Good morning, Catherine.
Catherine Mealor, Analyst, KBW: I want to start with the margin. The expansion was so great to see this quarter, The production deposit cost was really impressive. So just wanted to see that your outlook for the margin this year, Nicole. I know you're rate neutral and so I guess depending on what happens with rates, it feels like kind of a stable margin feels like
Nicole Stokes, Chief Financial Officer, Ameris Bancorp: the best way to model it, but you're coming in from
Catherine Mealor, Analyst, KBW: a higher level. So just kind of curious, how you're thinking about if there's any additional opportunities to actually increase the margin from here over the course of 25? Thanks.
Nicole Stokes, Chief Financial Officer, Ameris Bancorp: Sure. So, you're exactly right. At the end of last quarter or the call last quarter, I kind of guided we were at 3.51% margin and I guided less than anything above a 3.50% we were pleased with. And we kind of saw 2 to 3 basis points maybe of some expansion. And then we come out with 14 basis points of expansion.
But what I want to emphasize is that focus on what caused that expansion. And 10 basis points of that expansion was really related to some things that are going to come back. So we had 7 basis points of that margin expansion that was coming from the deposit and the funding mix from those public funds coming in and paying off the wholesale. So as those public funds roll out and we go back into some broker, that 7 basis points is going to come back out of the margin. And then we also had 3 basis points of what I call repricing lag, where we repriced our deposits very quickly after the Fed cut, and our loans are going to catch up to that.
As soon as the Fed paused, knew that our loans were going to catch up. So I feel like the 7 basis points from the funding side and the 3 basis points from those what I'm calling repricing lags are going to come back. So that would bring our margin back down to that 3.54% range, which is what I had guided last quarter. So I'm going to take a 10 basis point bump whenever I can, but I do think realistically the margin coming in kind of in that 3.50%, 3.55%, is consistent with our previous guidance and still what I'm guiding to. So again, 364 was elevated by about 10 basis points.
What I will say though on expansion going forward notice is our when you look at our production, when you look at our loan and deposit production, everything that we're putting on at this point is margin accretive. So depending upon if we can continue to grow deposits, we've been very our bankers have been very, very successful on the deposit front. Also keeping that non interest bearing mix right at 30% has been very, very helpful. If you had asked me last year if we would be able to grow deposits like we did and maintain that 30%, we it would have been it was very tough and we did it. Our banker stepped up and did it.
So that has helped as well. So those are kind of the headwinds and tailwinds going into margin next year.
Catherine Mealor, Analyst, KBW: Okay. That's helpful. So if we do want to model margin expansion, just start at 3.54% instead of 3.60%. Exactly. That's great.
Okay. And then, maybe just over to Steve's, your SBA levels were very elevated this quarter, which was great. Just kind of curious what you're thinking about a run rate appropriate run rate for that going into next year also?
Nicole Stokes, Chief Financial Officer, Ameris Bancorp: Yes. So we're looking to model kind of fee income, excluding mortgage. So take mortgage out because they're a little bit different growth rate. But fees are going to follow kind of our loan and deposit growth rate as well. So kind of in that 5% to 6%, 5% to 7% fee income increase.
Catherine Mealor, Analyst, KBW: And with this level of fees, was there anything kind of would you say elevated this quarter just to be aware of that when you that your product say that we're kind of pushed to this quarter, that just that we want to kind of run rate to pull out as we go into the Q1?
Nicole Stokes, Chief Financial Officer, Ameris Bancorp: No, I appreciate that question because when you really look at kind of just GAAP non interest income, remember in the Q2, we had the MSR sale gain. In the Q3, we had the MSR sale gain. And then so it looks kind of flat for the Q4, but we did have the if you take out the noise of those MSR sales, we did have the bump in the Q4 and it really came from our SBA group. There was maybe a little bit of elevated there as some of the demand had built up, but I think that is a starting run rate is a good spot.
Catherine Mealor, Analyst, KBW: Okay, great. All right. Thank you. Great year and great quarter. Appreciate it.
Thank you.
Wyatt, Conference Call Moderator: And the next question will come from David Feaster with Raymond (NSE:RYMD) James. Please go ahead. David, your line may be muted.
David Feaster, Analyst, Raymond James: Hey, good morning, everybody.
Chris Marinac, Analyst, Janney Montgomery Scott: There you are. Good morning. Good morning, David.
David Feaster, Analyst, Raymond James: Sorry about that. I just wanted to start on the production side. It's great to hear, I mean, such a strong increase. How do you think about what drove that, right? Is it you gaining market share, just your team hitting stride?
I know you guys have added some talent as well or are you seeing a shift in demand? Just kind of curious, what do you think is driving that increase in origination activity?
Palmer Proctor, CEO, Ameris Bancorp: I think it's just a reflection of consumer sentiment. There's a lot of more optimism out there. I think there are more clarity in some folks' minds. I think getting post election hopefully provide a little bit of clarity for folks, but a lot of our especially our commercial customers in particular, I think are feeling more optimistic as they look out. So and that's reflected obviously in that Q4 production.
So I feel good about that run rate and I feel good as we look out in our growth markets. So as I've always said, we're pretty blessed to be where we are in these high growth markets and we're starting to see that optimism reflect that. But we have done a good job on the hiring front. So that would be incremental volume on top of what we have already generated. So when I look out across really all the verticals with exception of mortgage just driven by the rate environment more so, we which could potentially be a tailwind for us depending on what happens with rates on the tenure, but we feel pretty optimistic about the outlook.
David Feaster, Analyst, Raymond James: Okay. That's helpful. And then, I mean, to that point, I mean, how do you think about the pace of growth? It sounds like optimism is improving. We got incremental production.
Obviously, we had some elevated payoffs this quarter. How do you think about growth as we look out to 2025?
Palmer Proctor, CEO, Ameris Bancorp: Well, in our situation, we're pretty conservative, as you know. And so we're focused more on controlled growth. I do not think that until we kind of get moving forward in this new environment, we'll figure out where that goes. But the nice thing is we're positioned to accelerate it or to maintain what we've got. So and then the nice thing too is that diversification within our balance sheet is having the ability to optimize margin versus just driving growth for the second growth.
So when you look at asset mix or duration risk and profiles, we're able that's really what we focused on the last 2 years, especially in an environment where the yield curve was inverted. So I think as we look out, given the different levers that we can pull, we feel pretty bullish about our ability to deliver on especially on our EPS growth.
David Feaster, Analyst, Raymond James: That's great. And then on the other side of it, right, I mean, Nicole, you alluded to the strength in the expense control that you guys have done. We've got pretty good visibility into the revenue growth, right, just given the accelerating loan growth and some stability in the margin to digital expansion because everything is pretty accretive. I'm just curious, how do you think about expense growth next year? Is there opportunity to potentially bring forward some expenses as you continue to invest?
I mean, we got the new hires that we talked about. I'm just curious how you think about expenses and your ability to drive positive operating leverage in 2025?
Nicole Stokes, Chief Financial Officer, Ameris Bancorp: No, that's a great point. So I think when you look at kind of consensus expenses, I think for the year, they look very reasonable right now. I think they're in about a 4.5% to 5 percent increase. I think they're a little bit light in the Q1. I think when we always have some cyclical payroll that comes in the Q1 with everybody resetting FICA and 401 matches and all of that.
So I think the Q1 when I look at consensus might be a little bit light, but I think for the year 4.5% to 5% growth in expenses is exactly spot on for consensus. I think just the Q1 maybe we need to shift a little bit into the quarter and out of kind of the 3rd, Q4, but I think the year to date is right.
Palmer Proctor, CEO, Ameris Bancorp: And David, one of the things that we do that's maybe different from others, I don't know, but we hired 24 bankers, for instance, commercial bankers this year, this past year. And we also called 24 bankers. And I think the mistake a lot of folks make is bringing on additional production folks to compensate for deficiencies or lack of production from others. And all you do is just add that to your run rate on your expense side. We've always been pretty consequential.
And so we brought in 24 and we eliminated 24. And when you kind of have that approach to things, it allows us to keep the expenses under control from an overhead standpoint and from a production standpoint more importantly.
David Feaster, Analyst, Raymond James: Thanks everybody.
Wyatt, Conference Call Moderator: Our next question will come from Russell Gunther with Stephens. Please go ahead.
Russell Gunther, Analyst, Stephens: Hey, good morning, guys.
Palmer Proctor, CEO, Ameris Bancorp: Good morning.
Nicole Stokes, Chief Financial Officer, Ameris Bancorp: Good morning.
Russell Gunther, Analyst, Stephens: Can we spend a minute on the mortgage banking gain on sale outlook for 2025, what you guys are thinking about both from a production and margin perspective?
Nicole Stokes, Chief Financial Officer, Ameris Bancorp: Yes. So we're we went from 217 to 240. We're kind of guiding in that 225 to 240 just based on what we're seeing and what we're seeing with demand right now. Of course, that's very market dependent. But based on what we're seeing today, kind of looking at a first, second quarter somewhere in that 2.25 to 2.40.
So kind of hovering about where it is today.
Russell Gunther, Analyst, Stephens: Okay, perfect. Thanks, Nicole. And then guys, just last one for me, switching gears here on to the capital deployment front. Obviously, carry excess capital and reserves, you mentioned what you have left on the buyback. I think last quarter talked about increased clarity around the election might provide a catalyst to accelerate that.
So how are you guys thinking about balancing what sounds like a very strong organic growth trajectory with the buyback lever and potentially acquisitions?
Palmer Proctor, CEO, Ameris Bancorp: Well, the first and foremost would be the organic growth and funding the organic growth. I would tell you buybacks right now would probably take a back seat to that. And then obviously, as opportunities come up, we'll take a look at them. But we are, as you know, very strategic in how we look at M and A and very different. And we don't like M and A just for the sake of just accumulating assets.
It's got to be more strategic in nature. So if you were trying to prioritize, I would tell you organic growth would come first, then maybe some selective M and A in there, but it has to be very selective and then buybacks in that order.
Russell Gunther, Analyst, Stephens: I appreciate that, Palmer. And maybe just a follow-up, because you guys have been very clear on the M and A front. It would take something special and strategic. And could you just give us a sense of the characteristics of what that would look like to Ameris maybe from a size and geographic perspective?
Palmer Proctor, CEO, Ameris Bancorp: Yes. Our approach there has not changed. So, obviously, Southeastern in nature. It could be something that could provide, we love, as you know, core funding. It could be something with a strong core deposit base.
It could be a bank that provides additional support for a business line that we're in, more on the core bank side, less on the non core bank side in terms of furthering initiative there, whether it was on commercial C and I, that could be of interest to us. And then it would have to be something that's a cultural fit. So
Wyatt, Conference Call Moderator: those are
Palmer Proctor, CEO, Ameris Bancorp: kind of the boxes that we need to check for us.
Russell Gunther, Analyst, Stephens: All right. Very good, guys. Thank you very much for taking my questions. And the
Wyatt, Conference Call Moderator: next question will come from Christopher Marinac with Janney Montgomery Scott. Please go ahead.
Chris Marinac, Analyst, Janney Montgomery Scott: Thanks. Good morning. I wanted to talk about the reserve and Palmer, we've had a couple of quarters in a row of very low criticized and classified loans and curious if the reserve build is just for loan growth or is there any anticipation that you might see to some backing up of the criticized numbers over time?
Doug Strange, Chief Credit Officer, Ameris Bancorp: Chris, this is Doug. The model drives our CECL reserve and so it's really just a function of that more so than anything. We lay out our indices that influence our CECL model on Slide 16. And then obviously, you bake in your economic forecast for that quarter and that produces our reserve need.
Chris Marinac, Analyst, Janney Montgomery Scott: Got it. So at the end of the day, you're performing better than the model on losses for sure, which is perfectly fine. And if you continue to grow into that as you have external growth.
Doug Strange, Chief Credit Officer, Ameris Bancorp: That's true because CECL's life of loan. So through a life of the loan, you can experience ups and downs. So but you're correct.
Chris Marinac, Analyst, Janney Montgomery Scott: Okay. And then perhaps asking M and A from another angle, Palmer, what's the opportunity to simply acquire businesses that aren't banks or teams of people? Do you see any more of that than what you've done in the last few years?
Palmer Proctor, CEO, Ameris Bancorp: Well, I think right now as an industry more of the chatter is obviously bank to bank as opposed to bank to non bank. But that doesn't mean there aren't some unique opportunities out there. I think the challenge of a lot of the non banks is from a funding perspective. How are you going to fund it if they don't have any core funding? So given the importance of that and given our desire to hold on to our core funding and not watch that diminish, that would probably take a back seat to bank M and A, traditional bank M and A.
Chris Marinac, Analyst, Janney Montgomery Scott: Great. Thanks for taking all of our questions this morning.
Palmer Proctor, CEO, Ameris Bancorp: You bet.
Wyatt, Conference Call Moderator: And our next question will come from Manuel Nieves with D. Please go ahead.
Chris Marinac, Analyst, Janney Montgomery Scott: Hey, good morning. On the NIM, could you go into a little bit more detail on what you're bringing on that's accretive, the types of loan yields you're bringing on, that production that's accretive to NIM going forward?
Nicole Stokes, Chief Financial Officer, Ameris Bancorp: Sure. Good morning. So from a loan production perspective for the quarter, our total company was right at 7% and that's kind of split up. The bank is kind of coming in around 8%. Premium finance is spot on that right at 7%.
Mortgage is a little bit lower at 6.5 ish. So kind of that all in blended rate for the company was about 7%. And then when you look at deposit production for the quarter, our blended total book came in at about $242,000,000 of new production. That's including the interest bearing. That's compared to a book of $212,000,000 So it's coming on a little bit higher than our average book.
And then our just on the interest bearing deposits, our production was about 3.25 about 3.25 percent and that's compared to a total book of right about 3%. So our coming on production is running about 25 to 30 basis points higher than our total average book. But then when you compare that to coming on loan production of 7%, you can see where that accretion everything that we're putting on is accretable to margin. It's coming in at a wider spread. It's coming in about a 3.75 spread versus a 3.50 spread.
The real question is whether we can continue to grow the non interest bearing at the pace that we're growing. Our bankers have just done a phenomenal job there.
Chris Marinac, Analyst, Janney Montgomery Scott: I appreciate that. Is you talked about the lag where loan yields might still reprice a bit from the last rate cut. Is there a good amount are you kind of done on the deposit side with cutting deposit costs from the December cut? You're implying that there's more on the loan side than the deposit side. Could you just go into detail on that a bit more?
Nicole Stokes, Chief Financial Officer, Ameris Bancorp: Sure. Yes. So on our deposit side, our treasure teams, our operations teams, they've done a great job of we are ready to go the day after the Fed cuts. So we've been able to kind of get ahead of that and be aggressive. Our betas have been on the down has been a little bit better with these first two cuts.
And some of that's market driven as well. So we've gotten ahead of the curve there. And then we knew that as soon as the Fed cut that we were going to have I'm sorry, as soon as the Fed stopped cutting that eventually those loans were going to reprice the lag of the loans were going to start re pricing down. So that's been that's kind of where I mean that we've been aggressive on the deposits and which has been great. And then but we know that we've got about $8,000,000,000 of loans that are going to be priced in the next year.
The good news is that there the weighted average on that, so even though it looks like there's some of that is like the premium finance production that's already been pricing, even though it's a fixed rate loan, it's behaving like a variable rate. So the average rate of those are a little less than 7.5% and our current production is 7%. So when you think about that, I think we're spot on where we should be with what re pricing if that all came down 50 basis points from that 7.40 down to a 7%. That would kind of be in line with what you're seeing with the recent Fed cut. So I don't think we have any outlier there.
I think it's just the natural progression of being able to be faster on the downside on the deposits than the loan side. And then you also we have some of our bond portfolio. We had some payoffs in the Q4 and then we have some more payoffs coming in or some maturities coming in June. So we've been able to grow our bond portfolio at these higher rates and so that's been helpful as well.
Chris Marinac, Analyst, Janney Montgomery Scott: I appreciate that. In the muni flows, so the expectation with the muni flows that might come back out in the Q1 just on seasonality is that that's going to be somewhat replaced by brokered and borrowings. Is that the right way to think about it?
Nicole Stokes, Chief Financial Officer, Ameris Bancorp: That's right. And so we always have our balance sheet. We always say that our balance sheet kind of bulges at the end of the year because we get which we appreciate those customers, where we get into public funds. And so that typically flows back out in the Q1. That's about $500,000,000 So when that flows back out and so we purposely kind of looking at Q3, 2nd and Q3 funding, we keep all of our funding short.
But all of our funding right now is very short. All of our brokered CDs are very short. So they will reprice. We've got about $800,000,000 of brokered right at 4.5 percent and so they will reprice down all in the Q1.
Chris Marinac, Analyst, Janney Montgomery Scott: I appreciate that. Thank you very much.
Palmer Proctor, CEO, Ameris Bancorp: And our
Wyatt, Conference Call Moderator: next question will come from again Russell Gunther with Stephens. Please go ahead.
Russell Gunther, Analyst, Stephens: Hey guys, thanks for taking the follow-up. Nicole, just wanted to piggyback on Manuel's question and appreciate the color on sort of where deposit production costs were coming on during the quarter. Could you kind of tie that together for us and give us a sense for where the spot deposit costs are shaking out?
Nicole Stokes, Chief Financial Officer, Ameris Bancorp: Yes. And I'm a little bit leery to do that, why I gave the quarter because some of that is skewed a little bit by some of that public funds. So our kind of right you basically are asking for December spot costs?
Russell Gunther, Analyst, Stephens: That would be helpful if possible.
Chris Marinac, Analyst, Janney Montgomery Scott: Yes, that
Russell Gunther, Analyst, Stephens: would be helpful if possible. Thank you.
Nicole Stokes, Chief Financial Officer, Ameris Bancorp: Yes. So for our spot cost December, they were right around 2%. But again, that's skewed. I want to make sure I'm very clear that that's skewed with some public funds. And also with some of our we had a tremendous amount of non interest bearing growth that came in, in December.
So I'd really rather if you kind of look at where a Q3 to a 4th quarter average, we were able to drop from about a 2.75 down to about a 2.40 for the quarter. So about 30 basis points down, which is good and we like that trend. But kind of our December growth, and really we saw that biggest change was in CDs, where we saw our CD production in December about 25 basis points less than the quarterly average.
Russell Gunther, Analyst, Stephens: Okay, got it. Thanks for taking the follow-up. I appreciate it.
Catherine Mealor, Analyst, KBW: Sure, absolutely.
Wyatt, Conference Call Moderator: This concludes our question and answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to Palmer Proctor for any closing remarks.
Palmer Proctor, CEO, Ameris Bancorp: Thank you, Wyatt. And I want to thank all of our teammates for another incredible year. I look at how we're set up for 2025, what gives me a lot of optimism is obviously our premier financial performance, but also our stable asset quality, our capital build and our revenue growth opportunities. We really appreciate your participation in today's call and we thank you all for your time and your interest in Ameris Bank.
Wyatt, Conference Call Moderator: The conference has now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect.
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