Teleconferência de Resultados do 3º Trimestre de 2026 do Bank of Marin Bancorp (BMRC): Margem e Crescimento de Empréstimos Melhoram

O Bank of Marin Bancorp (NASDAQ: BMRC) registrou maior rentabilidade no terceiro trimestre de 2026, com o aumento no rendimento dos empréstimos, o menor custo de captação de depósitos, a expansão da carteira de crédito e a gestão disciplinada de despesas impulsionando uma expansão de 10 pontos-base na margem financeira líquida.

Destaques Principais

• O lucro líquido subiu para US$ 9,9 milhões, ou US$ 0,62 por ação, em comparação a US$ 9,2 milhões, ou US$ 0,58 por ação, no trimestre anterior. O lucro líquido cresceu 32% em relação ao 3º trimestre de 2025.
• A receita líquida de juros atingiu US$ 31,4 milhões. O rendimento médio dos empréstimos aumentou 11 pontos-base na comparação trimestral, para 5,23%, enquanto o custo médio dos depósitos caiu 4 pontos-base, para 1,24%.
• A originação de empréstimos somou US$ 102 milhões, elevando o acumulado do ano para US$ 281 milhões, uma alta de 21% em relação ao ano anterior. Os novos desembolsos de empréstimos apresentaram rendimento médio ponderado de 6,65%.
• Os depósitos aumentaram US$ 25,3 milhões, incluindo um crescimento de US$ 45 milhões nos saldos não remunerados. Os depósitos não remunerados representaram 37,8% do total de depósitos.
• O retorno sobre o ativo médio melhorou para 1,05%, o retorno sobre o patrimônio líquido tangível médio atingiu 12,26% e o índice de eficiência recuou para 58,65%.
• As métricas de crédito foram mistas: os empréstimos em observação caíram US$ 36 milhões, enquanto os empréstimos classificados subiram US$ 15 milhões devido a um problema específico de um tomador envolvendo um imóvel comercial ocupado pelo proprietário.

Principais Dados Financeiros

Desempenho Operacional e de Negócios

A originação trimestral de empréstimos aumentou de aproximadamente US$ 98 milhões para US$ 102 milhões, enquanto as liberações de recursos subiram de US$ 62,8 milhões para US$ 63,6 milhões. As quitações caíram acentuadamente de US$ 71 milhões para US$ 31,6 milhões. A administração afirmou que a atividade de quitação parece estar se normalizando após vários trimestres de pressão decorrente da resolução de créditos problemáticos e do término de projetos de construção.

O banco adicionou US$ 25 milhões em compromissos de financiamento à construção durante o trimestre. A administração espera que esses compromissos sejam liberados nos trimestres subsequentes e destacou que os créditos para construção estão entre seus empréstimos imobiliários comerciais de maior rendimento.

O Bank of Marin também utilizou o excesso de liquidez para adquirir um lote de US$ 31 milhões em hipotecas residenciais da Califórnia. O lote possui um cupom de aproximadamente 6,20% e deve render cerca de 6% após o pequeno prêmio de compra. Com base em uma premissa de taxa de pré-pagamento condicional de 25%, a administração estimou uma vida média de aproximadamente 3,3 anos.

O índice empréstimo/depósito ficou em 63%, concedendo ao banco capacidade para sustentar concessões adicionais de crédito sem recorrer ao financiamento atacado. A administração também espera que o fluxo de caixa de sua carteira de títulos de menor duração apoie a expansão dos empréstimos.

A receita de tarifas do negócio principal fortaleceu-se. As receitas não provenientes de juros subiram US$ 501.000, incluindo um aumento de US$ 251.000 em tarifas de serviços sobre depósitos PJ após uma atualização de preços em 1º de julho e um dividendo especial de US$ 199.000 referente às ações do Federal Home Loan Bank. A empresa afirmou que outras iniciativas para aumento de receitas com tarifas estão em desenvolvimento além das tarifas de serviços de depósitos.

As despesas não provenientes de juros caíram aproximadamente US$ 1 milhão devido a um ajuste de provisionamento de remuneração variável, à ausência de certas despesas anuais registradas no trimestre anterior, a custos menores com serviços profissionais e à normalização das despesas com o seguro do FDIC.

O conselho de administração declarou um dividendo trimestral em dinheiro de US$ 0,25 por ação, marcando o 86º trimestre consecutivo de pagamento de dividendos da empresa.

Orientação da Administração (Guidance)

A administração espera que as despesas do 4º trimestre de 2026 permaneçam próximas aos níveis do 3º trimestre. Custos menores com salarios e benefícios podem persistir, embora gastos com ocupação e projetos de tecnologia da informação possam acelerar. Para a modelagem de 2027, a administração alertou que as despesas são sazonais e sugeriu a utilização dos trimestres correspondentes de 2026 como base, em vez de anualizar o 4º trimestre.

Sob uma projeção de gestão de ativos e passivos com balanço patrimonial estável, a empresa estima que o rendimento mensal dos empréstimos possa ser cerca de 25 pontos-base maior em 12 meses. A administração afirmou que o crescimento esperado nos empréstimos pode fornecer um potencial de alta adicional, mas não apresentou uma meta formal para a margem financeira líquida.

O pipeline de empréstimos para o 4º trimestre foi descrito como semelhante ao nível observado no início do 4º trimestre de 2025. A administração destacou que o cronograma dos acordos permanece incerto. Espera-se que a liberação de recursos para construção, a repacificação de taxas de empréstimos a taxas fixas e variáveis e novas originações com maior rendimento deem suporte ao rendimento dos empréstimos.

A administração informou que o beta histórico total de depósitos foi de 29%, comparado a 43% dos concorrentes no ciclo anterior de alta de juros, e não vê razão clara para que essa relação mude. A concentração de 37,8% em depósitos não remunerados do banco permanece central para sua estratégia de custo de captação.

Riscos e Pontos de Atenção

A alta das taxas de juros de mercado reduziu os outros resultados abrangentes acumulados em US$ 24,8 milhões durante o trimestre, reduzindo o índice de patrimônio líquido tangível e o valor patrimonial tangível por ação.

Os empréstimos classificados aumentaram US$ 15 milhões após o rebaixamento de uma relação de imóvel comercial ocupado pelo proprietário que enfrenta um problema específico do tomador. A administração afirmou que o tomador permanece em dia e que não espera perdas devido à forte cobertura de garantias. A provisão para perdas com crédito permaneceu em 1,07% do total de empréstimos.

A empresa registrou uma provisão para perdas com crédito sobre empréstimos de US$ 500.000 e uma provisão para compromissos não liberados de US$ 325.000, refletindo principalmente a expansão da carteira de crédito e maiores compromissos. As baixas líquidas de créditos de liquidação duvidosa foram mínimas.

A precificação de depósitos continua competitiva à medida que as taxas sobem. A administração declarou que as solicitações de clientes não aumentaram de forma relevante, mas saldos corporativos maiores podem gerar volatilidade de um trimestre para outro. O cronograma de quitação de empréstimos e a resolução de créditos em reestruturação também continuam difíceis de prever.

Destaques das Perguntas e Respostas dos Analistas

• Margem financeira líquida: A NIM em setembro foi de 3,54% em base equivalente a impostos e de 3,52% conforme relatado. A administração estimou que teria sido de aproximadamente 3,46% sem vendas unidirecionais de depósitos, mas afirmou que o banco tem tanto a capacidade quanto a intenção de continuar utilizando essa estratégia.
• Repacificação de empréstimos: A diferença de 142 pontos-base entre o rendimento de 6,65% nas novas liberações e o rendimento de 5,23% da carteira indica potencial para maior melhoria da margem à medida que os empréstimos forem repacificados e o mix do portfólio mude.
• Compras de empréstimos: A administração caracterizou a aquisição de hipotecas residenciais como oportunista, e não como uma estratégia primária de crescimento. O banco pode considerar compras adicionais quando a localização geográfica, as métricas de crédito e os retornos ajustados ao risco forem atraentes.
• Alocação de capital: Nenhuma ação foi recompra durante o trimestre. A administração disse que os índices de capital estão se aproximando dos níveis dos pares e que a empresa está perto de um ponto em que pode se sentir mais confortável para discutir as aprovações regulatórias necessárias.
• M&A: A administração continua a avaliar oportunidades, mas declarou que nenhuma conversa sobre aquisição está mais avançada do que anteriormente.
• Resolução de crédito: Um empréstimo de US$ 8 milhões sem auferição de juros pode gerar um impulso futuro nos lucros se for resolvido por meio do processo de referência judicial, embora a administração tenha declarado que o prazo é indeterminado.

Transcrição Completa da Teleconferência de Resultados

Transcrição completa da teleconferência de resultados

Comentários da administração

Krissy Meyer

Good morning, and thank you for joining Bank of Marin Bancorp's earnings call for the third quarter ended September 30, 2026. I'm Krissy Meyer, Corporate Secretary for Bank of Marin Bancorp. [Operator Instructions]

Joining us on the call today are Bank of Marin President and CEO, Tim Myers; and Chief Financial Officer, David Bonaccorso. Our earnings news release and supplementary presentation, which were issued this morning, can be found in the Investor Relations section of our website at bankofmarin.com, where this call is also being webcast. Closed captioning is available during the live webcast as well as on the webcast replay.

Before we begin, I want to note that we will be discussing some non-GAAP financial measures. Please refer to the reconciliation table in our earnings news release for both GAAP and non-GAAP measures. Additionally, the discussion on the call is based on information available as of Friday, October 23, 2026 and may contain forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties. Actual results may differ materially from those set forth in such statements. For a discussion on these risks and uncertainties, please review the forward-looking statements disclosure in our earnings news release as well as our SEC filings. Following our prepared remarks, Tim, Dave and our Chief Credit Officer, Misako Stewart, will be available to answer your questions.

And now I'd like to turn the call over to Tim Myers.

Timothy Myers

Thank you, Krissy. Good morning, everyone, and welcome to our quarterly earnings call. Our third quarter results reflected another period of improved financial performance. We increased earnings per share and return on average tangible common equity, expanded net interest margin, grew loans and noninterest-bearing deposits, bolstered core noninterest income and continued our prudent expense management. Our net interest margin expanded 10 basis points in the quarter which drove sequential quarter EPS growth of 7% and year-to-date EPS growth that was 62% higher than the prior year period.

Quarterly return on tangible common equity topped 12%. Return on average assets exceeded 1%. Our efficiency ratio improved to below 60%, and pretax pre-provision earnings increased by 17%. Higher of loan yields higher core fee income, lower deposit costs, healthy loan production and disciplined expense management all contributed to stronger profitability during the quarter. Taken together, these results reflect continued progress across the core drivers of our business and provide further evidence that our efforts are translating into stronger and more reliable core financial performance.

During the quarter, we originated $102 million in new loan commitments, which improved year-to-date originations to $281 million, a level that is 21% higher than last year. While funded loans of $64 million were relatively flat in the third quarter compared to the prior quarter, a higher level of unfunded commitments in the quarter includes $25 million of construction loan commitments, which will contribute to growth in subsequent quarters at relatively high interest rates as projects fund. Newly funded loans were originated at a weighted average rate that was 12 basis points higher than the prior quarter, which contributed to our net interest margin expansion during the quarter and we'll provide additional benefits in the fourth quarter.

Despite competitive pressures, the yield profile of new production remains attractive and is accretive to our overall portfolio yield. And we believe this healthy production, continued relationship development and disciplined underwriting will continue to translate into sustainable improvement in asset yields and earnings of time. Though organic loan fundings resulted in loan growth for the quarter, we supplemented that growth by using a portion of our excess liquidity to purchase a $31 million pool of California residential loans which we expect to provide attractive risk-adjusted returns.

Turning to credit quality. Special mention loans decreased by $36 million, while classified loans increased by $15 million. The movement in both categories was primarily due to the downgrade of $114 million owner-occupied commercial real estate relationship facing a borrower-specific issue. The borrowers paying as agreed, and we do not expect any loss given the strong collateralization. Special mention loans also benefited from $18 million in upgrades and payoffs. Net charge-offs were minimal, primarily driven by loan growth and higher commitments, we did record a $500,000 provision for credit losses on loans and a $325,000 provision for unfunded commitments.

Our allowance for credit losses was 1.07% of total loans, consistent with that of the prior quarter. Total deposit balances increased $25.3 million including a $45 million increase in noninterest-bearing balances, partially offset by decreases in money market and time accounts. We were especially pleased to see meaningful growth in noninterest-bearing deposits during the quarter, which we view as a reflection of the strong relationships our teams have built with clients over time. To that end, our focused outreach continued to result in strong new client activity generating $23.2 million in new relationships, including $13 million in new noninterest-bearing deposits.

Noninterest-bearing deposits represented 37.8% of total deposits at quarter end, continuing to differentiate our franchise and provide a meaningful funding advantage in a very competitive market. With financial markets expecting additional hikes in the Fed funds target rate range, we believe our high noninterest-bearing deposit concentration positions us well to achieve a relatively low rising rate deposit beta as we've experienced in previous rising rate cycles. Overall, the third quarter reflected continued progress across the franchise, including higher earnings, continued margin expansion and loan growth.

With that, I'll turn the call over to David Bonaccorso to discuss our financial results in more detail.

Dave Bonaccorso

Thanks, Tim. Good morning, everyone. Our third quarter net income was $9.9 million or $0.62 per share compared with $9.2 million or $0.58 per share in the prior quarter. Return on average assets increased to 1.05%, return on average tangible common equity grew to 12.26%, and our efficiency ratio improved to 58.65%. Our net interest income increased from the prior quarter to $31.4 million due to both higher interest income and lower interest expense. We recorded higher interest income on loans due to an increase in average loan yields from 5.12% in the second quarter to 5.23% in the third quarter.

Additionally, we recorded lower interest expense, largely due to a higher proportion of noninterest-bearing deposits and active balance sheet management through sales of one-way deposits, which drove a reduction in average total deposit costs from 1.28% to 1.24%. Our yield on new loan fundings increased to 6.65% during the quarter, which was a 12 basis point improvement over the prior quarter. The 142 basis point spread between the yield on new loan fundings and the yield on the entire loan portfolio is evidence of the opportunity we have to improve net interest margin through loan remixing and repricing over the coming quarters.

Importantly, with a loan-to-deposit ratio of 63% and high levels of cash flow expected from our shorter duration securities portfolio, we have substantial capacity to support loan growth without utilizing wholesale funding. Our noninterest income was up by $501,000 during the quarter, primarily due to $251,000 increase in service charges on business deposit accounts resulting from an updated pricing strategy effective July 1. And an increase in dividend income due to a special dividend on FHLB stock of $199,000. Importantly, the increase in service charges reflects initiatives we implemented earlier this year which are helping diversify our revenue streams and build a more durable source of recurring fee income, and we expect to see these continued benefits in our results going forward.

Our noninterest expense improved by approximately $1 million primarily related to an incentive bonus accrual adjustment, prior quarter annual expense that was not repeated, a reduction in professional service expense and more normalized FDIC insurance expense levels. Looking ahead, we expect expenses to remain well managed while continuing to make targeted investments in areas that support future growth. Although quarterly expense levels may vary, our focus remains on balancing disciplined cost management with investments in our people, technology and client-facing capabilities.

With quarterly improvement in interest income, interest expense, noninterest income and noninterest expense, our pretax pre-provision net income improved by 17% on a sequential quarter basis. As Tim noted earlier, growth in both loan fundings and loan commitments drove provisions this quarter, which impacted net income. The quarterly net income still improved 7% compared to the prior quarter and 32% compared to the third quarter of 2025. Our regulatory capital ratios continue to improve with our common equity Tier 1 ratio increasing to 12.96%. Our total capital ratio increasing to 15.59%, and our Tier 1 leverage ratio increasing to 9.04%.

Rising market interest rates negatively impacted AOCI by $24.8 million during the quarter, which lowered our tangible common equity ratio to 8.05% and tangible book value per share to $18.81. Given our continued strength, our Board of Directors declared a cash dividend of $0.25 per share on October 22, the 86th consecutive quarterly dividend paid by the company.

With that, I'll turn it back over to Tim for closing comments.

Timothy Myers

Thank you, Dave. To close, the third quarter was another quarter of strengthening profitability through our strategic focus areas. We delivered improved earnings, expanded net interest margin, we assume balance sheet growth and generated meaningful improvement in core fee income, while maintaining strong liquidity, capital levels and overall credit performance. While the current operating environment remains competitive, we are encouraged by the opportunities we see to continue growing relationships, add earning assets at attractive yields and maintain disciplined deposit pricing. Together with our ongoing focus on balance sheet management and expense control, we believe these efforts position us well to continue building long-term shareholder value.

With that, I want to thank everyone on today's call for your interest and support. We will now open the call to your questions.

Operator

[Operator Instructions] We'll take our first question from Woody Lay with KBW.

Perguntas e respostas

Wood Lay

I wanted to start on the net interest margin. Now it's great to see the quarter-over-quarter improvement. And I was just curious if you had the NIM in the month of September to kind of get an idea of the starting point for next quarter? And then just any additional thoughts on the magnitude of NIM expansion we could see over the coming quarters?

Dave Bonaccorso

So the September NIM was 3.54% tax equivalent, 3.52% reported. That includes about $145 million of one-way sales. So that definitely has a positive impact there. If you were to completely eliminate one-way sales, you're probably in the 3.46% area. But I think we have the intent and capacity to continue those. And quarter-to-date, we are about $115 or so million, which gives you sort of a $351 million level that we kept that level of one-way sales going. So around about way to give it to you, but there is some nuance to it.

Wood Lay

Yes. And I guess on the one-way strategy, so you all were at 100 -- call it, $131 million this past quarter. But on an average basis, do you think that can go to $300 million next quarter?

Dave Bonaccorso

No, no, no. I think slightly higher would be the way to go. $300 million would be out of the range, but could we be $150 million, $160 million. Yes, could it be $120 million or $100 million, yes. So that -- those are the magnitudes I have in mind.

The income from one-way sales this quarter, I believe, was $489,000 compared to $386,000 last quarter. And so I know there's a lot of attention on net interest income. But if you adjust for that, you basically assume that the deposits we have, if they weren't in one-way sales were on the balance sheet, our net interest income would have been about $489,000 higher. So another way of thinking about that.

You asked a question about margin trajectory and if you think of -- in the higher rate environment we're in now, if you think about our greatest challenge and our greatest strength, our greatest challenge is loan yields. So the higher environment gives us more time to reprice loans, allows variable rate loans to reset higher than new originations at higher yields than previously thought. And then our biggest strength is our deposit franchise.

And I think clearly, we get questions from customers about deposit rates. I wouldn't say it's been that material solar. But I think we've proven over a cycle, partly due to the high level of noninterest-bearing deposits, we tended to outperform. And if you look at peers, in the last cycle, our total deposit beta was 29% compared to 43% for peers. So I think on a relative basis, we're pushing very well for the rising rate environment, both managing deposit costs and then also continued loan repricing. There's lots of information about the repricing schedule on Page 13 of the deck.

Timothy Myers

Yes. I think, Woody, if you look at as our originations continue to improve, we're looking at a pipeline right now of the Q4 pretty similar to where we were last year. That ended up being a blowout quarter. But a lot of -- left here in the quarter was due to new loan originations. As Dave mentioned, the repricing over the next 12 to -- or 3 to 12 months variable-fixed rate repricing, we continue to think we have good tailwinds there.

And also, we talked about in the loan section. We have some nice tails from construction lending given the type of stuff we do in the geographies. We do it in that was really a headwind for a number of years, primarily in San Francisco. And so a lot of unused commitment is going to borrow on construction loans, and that's -- those are our highest priced commercial real estate loans. So no real silver bullet there for everything, but a lot of things they're going to add up to I think continued growth.

Dave Bonaccorso

Yes. And statistically, we've given out over the years is a monthly low yield 12 months from now. And based on our ALM forecasting with a flat balance sheet, we're looking at probably 25-ish basis points of monthly loan yield benefit a year from now, which I believe compares favorably to closer to 20 basis points last quarter. So that just shows a little bit more benefit in rising rates. And again, plant balance sheet there. So we have loan growth that we expect, there's some upside to that.

Wood Lay

Yes, that's great to hear. And maybe just one more follow-up on the deposit side, deposit betas. You mentioned a 29% historical beta, do you think that's the right way to think about it to the extent we get additional rate hikes from here?

Timothy Myers

Yes. I don't see why it would differ. The last cycle had the complication of the regional bank failures in our market impacting things. And so relative to our nationwide peer group, you could argue we were disproportionately affected by that, and we were still at 29% relative to the 43%. So I don't see why it would differ from that. And we've had a long history of timing interest-bearing balances, which really gets you off on the right foot from that perspective in a rising rate environment.

Operator

Our next question comes from Jeff Rulis with D.A. Davidson.

Jeff Rulis

I think you mentioned $102 million in origination activity. How does that compare linked quarter? And then a similar question, if you had payoffs both in the current and past quarter?

Dave Bonaccorso

Yes. So sequential quarter originations went from $98 million to $102 million roughly. Fundings went from $62.8 million to $63.6 million. Payoffs went from a pretty high margin, $71 million, down to $31.6 million. And there is a table in our earnings release that has all this information, you can catch all that.

Timothy Myers

Yes. And we're excluding that. The $31 million of mortgage purchases are excluded from the numbers you just gave. So a nice trend in the past. And certainly, a big chunk of our year-to-date payoffs have been working on some of the historical problem loans on the real estate and line side. So we feel much better about the trend of that as well.

Jeff Rulis

Okay. That was sort of the payoff visibility is historically pretty tough. But based on what you see, is that -- are you encouraged by maybe the payoff wall that you've seen that maybe is lower going forward? Or is there -- particularly, I guess, if we get higher rates, maybe also. But I guess the question is your expectations on payoff activity ahead.

Timothy Myers

No, that's fair. So there were 2 big headwinds there over the last year in a dead period. So we have about $28 million of the problematic loans, our big pandemic special CRE loan in the city and our large wine industry loan that we had talked about for both of which we had talked about for some time, that was $28 million of the payoffs. We also had a lot of construction projects that were completed which really the flip side of that is it brought our balances down to almost 0, like $16 million, but now we have added a bunch of new loans, those will fund up over the next 18, 24 months. So those are 2 of the larger headwinds for payoffs. So again, it's hard to predict timing. It's hard to predict resolution of workout credits or whatever, but we feel like it's a normalizing trend yet.

Dave Bonaccorso

And this is the first quarter in a year where we've been sort of our last couple of year average, we've averaged about $40-or-so million between $38 million and $42 million, let's say, depending on your time frame over the last couple of years in payoffs. So we've had a lot of headwinds the last few quarters. This is the first quarter we've had a little bit early from a payout perspective.

Jeff Rulis

Okay. And jumping off that, I guess, the further appetite for loan purchases, was this a one-off? Would you have more? And the kind of a related question is what rate did the mortgage pool come on this quarter?

Timothy Myers

I'll start with the first part. I'll let Dave answer about the mortgage pool. I mean, is something we want to be selective about. This is not how we're trying to drive our franchise value, but we can be strategic, given our loan-to-deposit ratio that mortgage pool we acquired a couple of years ago to help boost the yield and offset the impact or drive the earnings impact from the larger AFS trade that we did before the AGM trade, not at a much faster freight rate than we expected.

And so when we look at this year, we saw if we can find an opportunistic portfolio in the geography we're comfortable with, with the metrics we're comfortable with, we'll try to offset that. So that's effectively how we measure that out. We'll continue to be opportunistic about that. That's not our intent about how we're going to grow the bank. But we do have the liquidity and the loan-to-deposit ratio to continue to look at that.

So do you want to answer the rate question?

Dave Bonaccorso

Sure, yes. The coupon on the pool is about 620, and we paid a small premium for it. So our expectation is with pretty conservative rebase fees, probably yielding around 6% which we actually entered into this about 3 months ago, but that was about 160 basis point spread to treasuries at prime.

Operator

Our next question comes from Matthew Clark with Piper Sandler.

Matthew Clark

Just to round out that conversation on the single-family resi pool. What was the expected duration on that purchase?

Dave Bonaccorso

So we ran a 25 CPR, which gets you to about a 3.3-year average life 30-year collateral. So there can be movements in the average life depending on prepayment fees, but that's what we assumed, which we thought was in -- mortgage rates have moved up since then. So I don't think we're going to get the wave of very fast prepayments like we did on the prior pool.

Matthew Clark

Yes. Okay. And then any recoveries or interest reversals in the loan yield this quarter? I don't think so, but I wasn't sure.

Dave Bonaccorso

Nothing material.

Timothy Myers

Nothing meaningful. But we have the one large nonaccrual we've talked about that could resolve through the judicial reference process, but that is sort of an indeterminable period. So when that happens, that's an $8 million loan on nonaccrual, but nothing just last quarter, but that will be a tailwind when that finally resolved.

Matthew Clark

Okay. And then just back on the expense run rate, how should we think about a normalized run rate going forward here at least in the near term?

Dave Bonaccorso

So the -- I would say Q4 is probably going to look pretty similar to Q3. And my thinking behind that is we had some lower salaries and benefits expense this quarter. That could persist to the prior quarter. I think there's some acceleration that probably happens in occupancy as we're rehabbing a few locations and some IT projects catching up. But I think you then all that together, Q4 is probably pretty close to where we were in Q3.

But where I would remind folks, there's quite a bit of seasonality on our expense base. And the way to think about the quarters beyond that is probably to look at the year ago prior quarter. So I wouldn't launch your Q1 numbers off of our Q4 numbers. I would look at Q1 2026 and then apply some sort of growth rate to that we're looking at Q1 2027 and then throughout the year.

So in Q1, we have a lot of resets on personnel-related items. Q2 tends to be where our expenses being due to merit increases and a few special items in Q2 and then they start to drift down from there. And that's the pattern I would recommend thinking about going beyond Q4 this year.

Matthew Clark

Yes. Okay. Great. And then just on capital, you didn't buy back any shares this quarter. Just some color there. And then on Slide 6, you -- not that it's a new slide, but the mentioned acquisitions as part of your strategy, any update on conversations you might be having? Targets you might consider of late?

Timothy Myers

Yes, sure. I'll start bigger picture on the capital buyback. So we've talked pretty anode about working with our regulators, particularly [ DFPI ] on our held-to-maturity trade and that we were going to earn our way back into a more peer level, capital ratios before going back and going through the process of getting the necessary approvals tied to the overall dividend to the bank. So -- but we're getting closer to a period where we'll feel more comfortable having those conversations.

M&A, certainly with our return on profitability or the trajectory we're on the impact that's had on our valuation. That's helping. But I wouldn't say there's any conversations that are more progressed at this point than there have been. But I continue to do my job and be out talking to folks, and we would love to be opportunistic, and that's one of the key reasons we want to keep driving the valuation improvement.

Operator

Our next question comes from David Feaster of Raymond James.

David Feaster

I want a diverse start on the demand side. I'm curious how demand has trended across your footprint as rates have begun rising. And then just kind of how pipelines are. And then as it plays into that, just hiring, I know, has been a big focus for you all and kind of increased production from newer markets like Sacramento and some of the parts of the Bay Area. Kind of curious how productivity from those bankers is and your thoughts on hiring broadly?

Timothy Myers

Okay. David, there's a lot in there. So I think if you look at demand and the rate environment, where we've seen more is on the payoff side, like on the retail side, HELOCs, paying off with rates where they are but we continue to have or have seen much better demand on the consumer side. Again, like construction, with the bulk of our consumer direct consumer lending activity being kind in common loans really died in the save for a while. And I think we're a triple right now year-to-date or almost triple where we were the prior year despite where rates are because of the boom in San Francisco residential lending.

The commercial pipeline while overall, we're achieving a much more consistent and higher consistent level of production, we did have some deals pushed. So we feel good about the volume. Our pipeline looks similar now for Q4 than it did last year for Q4, and that ended up being a great quarter. It's always tough to say how that will all play out. But right now, we saw some residential lending on the floating home side, which we haven't really seen in a while, again, despite where rates are. So you don't know how borrower behavior when rates drop after you've done all that, but we're really not seeing it limit the amount of things going in the fund.

And I'm sorry if I missed something in there, but that's where we're just most -- and on the hiring side, no, we continue to look. Sometimes the hiring is more on the support underwriting function to support the new salespeople. So we've actually had a pretty active hiring quarter or going into Q4. Not all of it producers, but we continue to look to fill those positions and be opportunistic. And we're pretty excited, nothing dramatic to report at this time, but I think the teams are building out nicely to again get that more consistently higher level of activity. I feel good about the trajectory.

David Feaster

That's great. Maybe just on the other side of the balance sheet, just touching on funding. I mean, that's probably one of the more impressive things about the quarter in my mind. I mean, the noninterest-bearing deposit growth was phenomenal. I know we're entering into a seasonally weaker quarter in the fourth quarter. But curious, some of the drivers behind the growth you saw this quarter and how customers are responding as rates are rising? Have you seen more exception pricing requests? Do you see more funding cost leverage on the horizon? And just any thoughts on the deposit side?

Timothy Myers

Well, I think for us, every request is an exception pricing request, and that's a contact. That's partly how we manage that, right? And so I do not -- I have not seen a wave of request for activity than we would have thought, but that's because of the ongoing day-to-day relationship management. The fluctuations are largely driven by balances within our larger customers. And so our goal is really to maintain that and not have them move those funds out elsewhere, but those are operating balances.

We have had over the last couple of quarters the money we where it's a quasi or public entity that investment policies and that money is going to sit in some other type of investment vehicle generating a higher yield than we're willing to pay. But we're not -- and that was more last quarter than this quarter, to be honest. So a pretty bulky impact in the quarter on the deposit side in terms of the trends. Our goal is to just continue to get better had new business client acquisition. Of course, we want to continue to acquire consumer loans to get those business operating accounts, and we continue to have strategies around how we continue to evolve or get better at that, again, have a more consistent growth and get more granularity from there. So as we continue to focus on that and not just sort of leave it to fate in terms of deposit balances.

David Feaster

Okay. And then -- that's great. And then just last one, just -- you've done a great job finding opportunity to maybe charge for products and services that you haven't historically or maybe where you were under charging. You talked about $1 million kind of annualized run rate that you've seen so far. Where are we at in that process? It sounds like, from your commentary, it sounds like there might be some more on the horizon, but curious kind of where are we in that process as you think about opportunities to just maybe generate some revenues where you maybe should have been already?

Timothy Myers

Yes. So I'll break that into parts. We continue to have things coming online, working on that will overall drive greater noninterest income, particularly related to the business service fees. Those are just things where we were undercharging or when you look at a bank that grew in large part by acquisition of smaller banks, very common for banks to waive or have generous fee schedules, et cetera. And it was taking the time to sit back and quantify and qualify that and what is need to look like, what does it need to look like relative to our peers, what's fair, tier that properly.

And so that is implemented. So that run rate is based on this new fee schedule for our business, commercial treasury management customers that utilize those services. We'll continue to look to add things that will be additive to that. Sorry for the redundancy there. But we do have other things in the works overall to drive fee income unrelated to deposit service rate.

Operator

[Operator Instructions] We have no further questions at this time. I'll hand it back to Tim Myers for closing remarks.

Timothy Myers

Thank you very much. Thank you, everyone, for joining. As always, please feel free to reach out to us. We're happy to provide more color. We look forward to talking to you next quarter.