John C. Gerspach
Analyst · Nomura
Okay, thank you, Vikram, and good morning, everyone. Before I go into more detail on the quarter, I'd like to highlight a few significant items affecting our results. First, on the revenue slide -- on the revenue side, CVA and DVA were negative $1.3 billion in the first quarter as Citi's credit spreads tightened. We also benefited from a pretax gain of nearly $500 million related to minority investments. On the expense side, legal and related expenses remained elevated at over $500 million. However, repositioning charges declined to $66 million from over $400 million in the prior quarter. Now on Slide 4, we show first quarter results. Citigroup reported net income of $2.9 billion or $0.95 per diluted share. Excluding CVA/DVA and the minority investment gain, earnings were $3.4 billion or $1.11 per diluted share. Revenues of $19.4 billion were down 2% versus the prior year on a reported basis. However, excluding CVA/DVA and the minority investment gain, revenues were up 1% from last year as revenue growth in Citicorp outpaced the decline in Citi Holdings. Expenses of $12.3 billion were roughly flat year-over-year on a reported basis. Excluding the impact of foreign exchange translation and the significant expense items I just mentioned, operating expenses were up less than 1%. Incremental investment spending was more than offset by efficiency savings. Credit costs of $3 billion were down 5% versus last year. Net credit losses of $4 billion were down 37% year-over-year, including incremental charge-offs of approximately $370 million in the first quarter related to previously deferred principal balances on modified mortgages, which I'll discuss later. Excluding these incremental charge-offs, NCLs would have been down 43% from last year. Virtually all of the incremental $370 million of charge-offs was offset by a reserve release specific to the deferred principal amounts, and so the net impact was essentially earnings neutral. Excluding this specific release, the net reserve release in the first quarter would have been roughly $800 million, down from $3.3 billion in the prior year. Citigroup end-of-period loans were up 2% from last year to nearly $650 billion as strong loan growth in Citicorp continued to outpace the wind down of Citi Holdings and deposits grew 5% to over $900 billion. On Slide 5, we show results for Citicorp and Citi Holdings, excluding the impact of CVA/DVA. Citicorp generated first quarter revenues of $19.4 billion and net income of $5.2 billion. Year-over-year, Citicorp's revenues and expenses grew by 6% and 1%, respectively, with positive operating leverage in every business. Pre-provision net revenues in Citicorp were over $9 billion for the quarter, up 12% from last year. And for the fifth consecutive quarter, we grew loans year-over-year in every business in Citicorp. Citicorp's loans grew 12%, with consumer up 6% and corporate loans up 23%. Citi Holdings had revenues of $786 million and a net loss of $1.1 billion. Citi Holdings ended the quarter with $209 billion of assets, down $16 billion during the quarter and $86 billion or nearly 30% year-over-year. At quarter end, Citi Holdings accounted for just under 11% of total Citigroup assets. On Slide 6, we show a 9-quarter trend for Citicorp's results. Excluding CVA/DVA, Citicorp's revenues of $19.4 billion in the first quarter were up 6% from the prior year and up 23% from the prior quarter, driven by growth in each of our core businesses. Operating expenses of $10.3 billion were up slightly versus the prior year on a reported basis. Excluding the impact of FX and the significant expense items I noted earlier, expenses were up 2% on higher volumes in Consumer Banking and Transaction Services. Incremental investment spending was more than offset by efficiency savings. Citicorp's net credit losses were $2.2 billion, down over 30% from the prior year, driven by improvement in North America cards. The net loan loss reserve release in Citicorp was significantly lower this quarter, at $588 million compared to $1.8 billion last year. This reflects lower net releases in North America cards, as well as reserve builds in international Consumer Banking and the corporate portfolio, primarily driven by loan growth. Excluding CVA/DVA, earnings before taxes of $7.4 billion were up 12% versus last year and more than double from the prior quarter, driven by higher revenues and lower net credit losses, partially offset by a lower net reserve release. On Slide 7, we show results for our global consumer bank. In the first quarter, we generated $10 billion in revenues, up 6% year-over-year on a constant dollar basis. International revenue growth has accelerated in recent quarters, reflecting our investments, while in North America, the turnaround continued. Excluding loan loss reserves, we have steadily grown our pretax earnings each quarter for over 2 years, with strong recent growth in North America. Slide 8 shows the results for North America Consumer Banking, which now includes retail partner cards and Citi retail services. Total revenues of $5.2 billion were up 5% versus last year, largely driven by higher gains on sales of mortgage loans. Card revenues declined year-over-year, reflecting spread compression in branded cards due to the continued impact of the look-back provisions of CARD Act and higher promotional balances, as well as lower average card loans. Expenses of $2.3 billion were up 3% year-over-year as incremental investments were partially offset by efficiency savings and the absence of a litigation reserve in the prior year. Credit costs declined by nearly 1/3 from last year to $802 million. Net credit losses were down 31% to $1.6 billion, driven by cards, and the net reserve release was $841 million this quarter compared to $1.2 billion in the prior year. Earnings before tax, excluding the impact of loan loss reserves, grew to $1.2 billion from less than $300 million last year. Overall, we continue to see progress in our North America consumer franchise. Average deposits grew for the fourth consecutive quarter, up 4% year-over-year, including double-digit growth in checking account balances. In branded cards, accounts also grew for the fourth consecutive quarter, up 5% year-over-year, and purchase sales grew 3%. And in retail services, purchase sales were up 2%. Turning to international Consumer Banking on Slide 9. In total, the international consumer businesses achieved positive operating leverage for the second consecutive quarter, with reported revenue and expense growth of 4% and 2%, respectively. On a constant dollar basis, revenues grew 7% and expenses were up 5%. Revenue growth continued to reflect improvement in most underlying drivers, offset by spread compression due in part to the continued migration to higher quality borrowers. Accounts grew 6% year-over-year, and on a constant dollar basis, we grew average deposits, average loans and purchase sales in every region in the first quarter. Investment sales remained lower than the prior year. However, we saw a rebound from the fourth quarter as retail investors sentiment improved. As I noted, expenses of $2.9 billion were up 5% on a constant dollar basis, driven by volume-related costs as modest incremental investment spending was more than offset by efficiency savings. Credit costs were $799 million in the first quarter as compared to $490 million last year. While net credit losses declined modestly to $649 million, we recorded a net reserve build of $106 million in the first quarter, principally due to portfolio growth versus a net release in the prior year. Earnings before tax, excluding the impact of loan loss reserves, grew 15% year-over-year to $1.3 billion. On Slide 10, we show growth trends for international Consumer Banking in more detail. On a constant dollar basis, average loans grew 12% over the prior year; average deposits were up 3%; and purchase sales grew 13%. As reported, on a trailing 12-month basis, we have grown both net credit margin and pretax earnings, excluding the impact of loan loss reserves, each quarter for over 2 years. Slide 11 shows our Securities and Banking business. Excluding CVA/DVA, revenues of $6.7 billion were up 6% from last year and more than double the revenues of the prior quarter. Investment banking revenues of $865 million were up 2% from the prior year on strong debt underwriting activity and up 36% sequentially as both equity and debt underwriting rebounded from fourth quarter levels. While M&A activity remains under pressure in the current environment, Citi has gained share in announced M&A year-to-date. x CVA/DVA, equity market revenues of $902 million were down 18% from the prior year on lower market volumes. However, sequentially, revenues were up significantly on improved trading performance in derivatives and higher cash equities revenues. Fixed income market revenues, x CVA/DVA, of $4.7 billion were up 19% year-over-year and more than double from fourth quarter levels, driven by strong performance in G10 Rates and local markets foreign exchange. Lending revenues of $56 million were down significantly versus prior periods as strong growth in net interest revenues was more than offset by over $500 million of losses on lending hedges in the first quarter, driven by spread tightening. Private bank revenues, excluding CVA/DVA, were $576 million, up 11% versus each of the prior periods on growth in deposit and loan volumes, as well as stronger capital markets activity. Total operating expenses of $3.7 billion were down 2% from last year, driven by efficiency savings, and credit costs were $58 million in the first quarter versus a benefit of $187 million last year. Moving to Transaction Services on Slide 12. Revenues of $2.7 billion were up 7% from last year as strong growth in Treasury and Trade Solutions more than offset a decline in Securities and Fund Services. Treasury and Trade Solutions was up 11%, driven by strong growth in deposits and trade loans. Securities and Fund Services was down 4% year-over-year. However, revenues grew 5% sequentially as activity levels began to rebound from the fourth quarter. The underlying drivers for Transaction Services continue to show strong momentum. End of period trade loans were up nearly 60% from the first quarter of last year, and average deposits were up 6%. Assets under custody were flat year-over-year, but up 4% from the prior quarter. Expenses of $1.4 billion were up 3% versus last year on higher volumes, as incremental investment spending was more than offset by efficiency savings. Importantly, we achieved positive operating leverage in Transaction Services in the first quarter, and this should be sustainable going forward. Strong revenues, combined with a modest increase in expenses, drove 10% earnings growth year-over-year to over $900 million. On Slide 13, we show a 9-quarter trend for Citi Holdings. The reported loss in Citi Holdings was $1 billion in the first quarter, slightly higher versus last year but improved from the prior quarter. Revenues, excluding CVA/DVA, were down over 50% year-over-year to $786 million, due primarily to lower assets, as well as the absence of positive private equity marks in the prior period. Operating expenses of $1.2 billion were down 16% versus last year, and total credit costs were down 21% to $1.3 billion. Looking at Citi Holdings in more detail on Slide 14. Revenues in Brokerage and Asset Management were negative $46 million this quarter, down from last year due to a lower contribution from the Morgan Stanley Smith Barney joint venture, as well as higher funding costs. In Local Consumer Lending, revenues were down 13% versus last year to $1.3 billion, driven by declining loan balances. In the Special Asset Pool, revenues, x CVA/DVA, were negative $494 million in the first quarter. Net interest revenue was negative $102 million as interest-earning assets continued to represent a smaller portion of the Special Asset Pool, while we continued to incur funding costs on the total portfolio. Noninterest revenue, excluding CVA/DVA, was negative $392 million, down $353 million from prior year, driven by the absence of positive private equity marks in the prior year period, as well as a reserve build of $150 million related to private-label mortgage securitizations. Citi Holdings operating expenses were down 16% year-over-year to $1.2 billion, mainly due to declining assets, partially offset by higher legal and related costs. Credit costs were down 21% year-over-year to $1.3 billion. Total net credit losses were down 43% to $1.7 billion, reflecting a significant reduction in loans in the Special Asset Pool, as well as a declining loan balance and improved credit trends in Local Consumer Lending. On a sequential basis, net credit losses were up $222 million, driven by an increase in North America mortgages. As I noted earlier, in the first quarter, we recorded roughly $370 million of incremental charge-offs related to previously deferred principal balances on modified mortgages, virtually all of which was offset by a specific reserve release. These charge-offs were related to anticipated forgiveness of principal, largely in connection with the national mortgage settlement. Excluding the incremental charge-offs, net credit losses in Citi Holdings would have declined 10% sequentially. In total, we released $576 million of net loan loss reserves in Citi Holdings compared to $1.5 billion in the prior year. Slide 15 shows Citi Holdings' assets. We ended the quarter with $209 billion in Citi Holdings or just under 11% of total Citigroup assets. The $16 billion reduction in the first quarter was comprised of roughly $4 billion of asset sales and business dispositions, approximately $11 billion of net runoff and paydowns and $1 billion of net cost of credit and net asset marks. Slide 16 shows the results for the Corporate/Other segment. Revenues of $500 million were up significantly from last year, mainly driven by the $477 million net gain related to minority investments, which I described earlier. Expenses were up $148 million versus last year, driven by higher legal and related costs. Assets of $312 billion included approximately $121 billion of cash and cash equivalents and $135 billion of liquid available-for-sale securities. Turning to total Citigroup expenses on Slide 17. First quarter expenses of $12.3 billion were roughly flat to the prior year, with both periods including a similar combined level of legal and related costs and repositioning charges of around $600 million. Adjusting for these items, as well as the impact of foreign exchange, core operating expenses grew less than 1% in the first quarter. Incremental investment spending of $400 million was more than offset by nearly $600 million of efficiency savings. We continue to be highly focused on managing our core operating expenses. Slide 18 shows total Citigroup net credit losses and loan loss reserves. NCLs continued to improve in the first quarter, down 4% sequentially to $4 billion, and the net loan loss reserve release was $1.2 billion, down from $1.5 billion in the fourth quarter. Excluding the incremental mortgage charge-offs I mentioned earlier of roughly $370 million, NCLs would have been down 13% sequentially and the net reserve release would have been roughly $800 million. We ended the quarter with $29 billion of total loan loss reserves, and our loan loss reserve ratio was 4.5%. Consumer NCLs were stable versus the fourth quarter at $4 billion even with the incremental mortgage charge-offs, and we released $1.3 billion in consumer loan loss reserves. Corporate credit costs were $29 million in the first quarter compared to a net benefit of $158 million last quarter as we recorded a net build in reserves this quarter versus a release in the prior period. Slide 19 shows our international consumer credit trends, which generally remained stable to improving in Citicorp in the first quarter as loans continued to grow. In Asia, the NCL rate continued to improve in the first quarter and 90-plus-day delinquencies were fairly flat at around 50 basis points. In Latin America, the sequential decline in NCL rate reflects, in part, the absence of adjustments in Central America, which resulted in higher credit losses in the fourth quarter. However, even excluding these adjustments from the prior period, the NCL rate would have been improved sequentially. In Local Consumer Lending in Citi Holdings, net credit losses were down quarter-over-quarter on a dollar basis. However, the NCL rate increased on a lower average loan balance. The increase in the 90-plus-day delinquency rate was also primarily driven by the decline in loans. On Slide 20, we show the North America mortgage portfolio in Citi Holdings split between residential first mortgages and home equity loans. Regarding the incremental charge-offs of about $370 million in North America real estate, approximately $315 million was attributable to residential first mortgages, with the remainder in home equity loans. Excluding this action, total net credit losses for North America real estate in Citi Holdings would have been down slightly versus the prior quarter. In residential first mortgages, we ended the quarter with $65 billion of loans, down 14% from a year ago. Excluding the incremental charge-offs in the first quarter, net credit losses would have increased by 4% from the fourth quarter. 90-plus-day delinquencies remained stable in the first quarter at just over $4 billion. However, we continue to watch these trends closely. In home equity loans, we ended the quarter with nearly $39 billion of loans, down 13% from a year ago. Excluding the incremental charge-offs in the first quarter, net credit losses would have been down 5% sequentially, and 90-plus-day delinquencies were also down versus the prior quarter at roughly $900 million. In total, we continue to allocate nearly $10 billion of our total loan loss reserves to North America real estate lending in Citi Holdings. And excluding the incremental NCL action this quarter, we maintained over 30 months of coincident NCL coverage. On Slide 21, we show our key capital metrics. Our total Tier 1 capital ratio was 14.2% as of the first quarter, and our Tier 1 common ratio was 12.4%, up 60 basis points from year end. We also grew our tangible book value to $50.90 per share. As Vikram noted, at the end of the first quarter, our estimated Tier 1 common ratio under Basel III was 7.2%, and this included approximately 120 basis points of impact from our nonconsolidated minority investments in financial companies, including the Morgan Stanley Smith Barney joint venture and Akbank. We continue to expect to be above 8% Basel III -- above our 8% Basel III target even if Morgan Stanley does not exercise its option to buy 14% of the JV this year. Now let me close with some comments about the outlook. First, Global Consumer Banking, our largest business, continues to produce good growth in revenues and earnings, as well as in key drivers like loans and deposits. Credit quality remains good in Asia and Latin America and continues to improve in the U.S. We produced positive operating leverage across all major regions in consumer banking in the first quarter, although we do not expect to see sustained positive operating leverage in North America until the end of the year. Transaction Services also continues to produce strong revenue and earnings growth and had positive operating leverage a quarter earlier than we had previously expected. Treasury and Trade Solutions is driving the growth in Transaction Services, reflecting our ongoing expansion in trade finance, where our unique and large global footprint gives us an unmatched competitive advantage. We are optimistic that Transaction Services will have sustained growth and positive operating leverage in the coming quarters. In Securities and Banking, there were a few key takeaways this quarter. First, we believe our underperformance in equities in the second half of last year is behind us. Our proprietary trading business is gone, and our equity derivatives business recovered well, which, we believe, reflects changes we made to that business, including new leadership. Second, our investment banking franchise is beginning to see market share gains in M&A and equity underwriting, while our strong debt underwriting business continues to perform. We think those gains could be an early sign that the investments we made in investment banking resources are beginning to pay off. And finally, our fixed income business continues to perform well and had a particularly strong first quarter. Overall, we continue to remain highly focused on managing expenses while still investing in key areas. Expenses were relatively flat year-over-year, and we are still targeting 2012 expenses to be $2.5 billion to $3 billion lower than the 2011 reported numbers, excluding, of course, any large impact resulting from foreign exchange or any significant unanticipated items. In Holdings, the wind-down of assets will continue and our primary focus remains the mortgage portfolio. While our portfolio is smaller than our peers’, we continue to believe that mortgages represent the greatest risk to any major bank balance sheet and a number of headwinds remain. More broadly, while the macro environment has improved compared to the second half of last year, there is still much uncertainty, which has been underscored by the recent spate of mixed economic data and rekindled eurozone fears, so we will continue to manage risk carefully and to maintain a strong balance sheet. We remain very optimistic about our prospects given our client franchise, our unique mix of businesses and our unparalleled footprint. Vikram and I will now be happy to answer your questions.