Peter Ho
Analyst · Jefferies. Please go ahead
Great. Thanks, Cindy. Good morning, everyone. Before I start our comments, let me just give you a little commentary on Hurricane Douglas, which come through the island this weekend. Yesterday, Douglas actually missed the big island without actually going to a Hurricane warning passed by both Oahu and Maui, where we were in a hurricane watch, but really had a somewhat nominal impact from the storm. And then thankfully, cleared Hawaii late last night, or actually early this morning. So from that standpoint, we obviously feel blessed and fortunate to have made it through this near miss. And given the circumstances, we'll certainly take that. Today marks Bank of Hawaii's six month anniversary, in our dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic. As our first executive all hands meeting was held on January 27 of this year. And I have a notation in my outlook calendar that describes that meeting, as a meeting to discuss the virus in China. How things have changed in six months? As you know, COVID-19 has had a dramatic effect on nearly all aspects and walks of life globally and nationally. Hawaii certainly has been impacted no differently. And while we're one of the nation's best performing state by infection statistic to-date, the consequences of the virus have been economically dramatic. This past Friday, our board met to hold a regularly scheduled board meeting. At that meeting, I presented a six-month review of our COVID-19 response. And I thought, before we get into the heart of our quarterly review, I'd share with you some of what I shared with them. I segmented my review into our core stakeholders, our community, our customers, our teammates, and of course, our shareholders. From a community standpoint, we recognize that as a leading company in the islands for nearly 123 years, people expect us to take a leadership role, and to give of ourselves freely in times of crisis and need. From the leadership standpoint, I and other members of our management team and board of directors are actively engaged in numerous philanthropic organizations, government sponsored task forces and private sector committees engaged in supporting and leading our community at this time. Our foundation also made early in the pandemic, a $3 million gift to the Hawaii Community Foundation to provide COVID-19 humanitarian, health and economic support to the community. This is a largest corporate gift to-date in the islands, and as was our hope, helped to spur further support from the corporate community. I note that funding, as I mentioned, was provided directly from our foundation, whose capital base is separate and distinct from the bank. Finally, from a community standpoint, Bank of Hawaii Foundation recently released a study called COVID-19 and Hawaii Facts and Insights. The study was performed by anthology research at respected local market research company, and was based on live and online survey data from over 1,000 respondents, making it the largest study of its kind in Hawaii. To-date, we believe the study will help better inform the general community, and help local policymakers make informed decisions. From a customer standpoint, we've been very active in providing real solutions and resources to many parts of our customer base. We made over 4,500 PPP loans totaling over $560 million. We've helped more than 17,000 people realign their loan terms in support of the near-term dislocations caused by the pandemic. With numerous government stimulus and deferral programs afoot during the pandemic, we saw contact center volume spike 69% in the month of April, requiring enormous commitment and support from our contact center staff. Also, as customers have sheltered closer to home, we've seen unprecedented digital banking activity. Thanks to many years of focus on our digital channels, we've been gratified to see year-to-date mobile deposit growth of 36%, online deposit account openings growth of 300%, online mortgage app growth of 142% and online HELOC app growth of 79% year-to-date as compared to last year. As for our teammates, we've been able to hold FTE levels steady. With our cafeteria operation suspended, we've created a program called meals-to-go, repairing a weekly to go meal available to all employees. To-date, we've distributed nearly 13,000 meals serving over 50,000 people. We encourage our employees to share their meals with family, friends and neighbors. Our employees' health is our paramount concern and we spent over $280,000 on PPE, and plan to spend ultimately approximately $2 million on Plexiglas barriers and thermal scanning equipment. We built a phone-based daily health screening app for our employees, and are in the process upgrading our filtration, air replenishment infrastructure to multiples of industry standard. Finally for our shareholders, today, we've been able to weather the storm while maintaining solid financial and business results. Our market valuation as measured by price to book continues to lead our marketplace. We continue to gain market share in both loans and deposits on a one year basis, through 3/31 of this year. We continue to fortify our balance sheet from credit losses in a measured, appropriate and balanced way. Before I turn the call over to Mary, who will brief you on credit quality, and then Dean, who will discuss our financials, I wanted to finish off with a quick review of the local Hawaiian economy. Unemployment in Hawaii moved from 2.4% in March to 23.8% and 23.5% in April and May, as the stay-at-home orders and travel quarantine orders went into place in the islands. Due to the unemployment, however, improved dramatically to 13.9%, in part as a result of the partial reopening of the local economy, and in part due to the PPP and other federal stimulus programs. The green columns represent UHERO's most recent forecast, which is foundationally what we incorporate into our own risk and financial modeling. As you can see, these numbers peak up in the following quarters. Ultimately, the direction of future unemployment will be impacted by whatever new federal stimulus comes about, and the timing of such, as well as the trend and infection rates here in the islands, which will thus drive policy decisions around the rate of reopening. On the next slide, you'll see a longer-term forecast for unemployment. And on the next page, you see GDP and personal income forecasts showing 2020 declines of 11% and 5%. I think, I'd apply the same contingencies on directionality of the accuracy of these forecasts at this time. Fundamentally, Bank of Hawaii remains well-positioned. We have solid credit statistics. Our base operation continues to grow in a challenged environment. Our liquidity and capital levels are robust. Now, let me turn the call over to Mary Sellers.