Good morning, and welcome to CIT’s Third Quarter 2018 Earnings Conference Call. My name is Nicole and I will be your operator today. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. There will be a question-and-answer session later in the call. [Operator Instructions] As a reminder this conference call is being recorded. I would now like to turn the call over to Barbara Callahan, Head of Investor Relations. Please proceed, ma’am.

Thank you, Nicole. Good morning, and welcome to CIT’s third quarter 2018 conference call. The call today will be hosted by Ellen Alemany, Chairwoman and CEO; and John Fawcett, our CFO. After Ellen and John’s prepared remarks, we will have a question-and-answer session. As a courtesy to others on the call, we ask that you limit yourself to one question and a followup and then return to the call queue, if you have additional questions. We will do our best to answer as many questions as possible in the time we have this morning. Elements of this call are forward-looking in nature and may involve risks, uncertainties and contingencies that may cause actual results to differ materially from those anticipated. Any forward-looking statements relate only to the time and date of this call. We disclaim any duty to update these statements based on new information, future events or otherwise. For information about risk factors relating to the business, please refer to our 2017 Form 10-K. Any references to non-GAAP financial measures are meant to provide meaningful insights and are reconciled with GAAP in our press release. Also, as part of the call this morning, we will be referencing a presentation that is available on the Investor Relations section of our website at cit.com. Now I’ll turn the call now over to Ellen Alemany.

Thank you, Barbara. Good morning everyone and thank you for joining the call. In the third quarter we published a strong progress on all facets of our strategic plan and I’ll touch on a few highlights shortly. First, let me start with results. We posted net income available to common shareholders of $132 million or $1.15 per common share and income from continuing operations available to common shareholders excluding noteworthy items of $131 million or $1.15 per share. Results reflect core asset growth, lower operating expenses and continued capital optimization. This led to a return on tangible common equity from continuing operations excluding noteworthy items of about 9.8% and when normalizing for the semiannual preferred dividend it was 9.4% up from 8.9% last quarter. Our roadmap to deliver improved profitability has been the five points of our strategic plan which are on Slide 2 and I want to share some highlights on each point. Our core average loan and lease portfolio grew 8% year-over-year and 2% from the prior quarter. Prepayments declined in the third quarter; however, the environment remains competitive and we could see elevated prepayment levels again in the near term. Despite the competition, we have found strategic opportunities that align with our core strengths and risk framework. In addition our growth initiatives across the business have gained momentum which helped to drive a 38% increase in originations from the year ago period. Our market and structuring expertise enabled us to pursue thoughtful growth while remaining disciplined on credit. The commercial finance business posted strong growth with average loans and leases up 7% from a year ago, driven largely from asset based lending within the energy, healthcare, and C&I verticals. The business capital division posted another quarter of solid growth with assets up 10% year-over-year and 3% quarter-over-quarter.…

Thank you Ellen and good morning everyone. Net income for the third quarter on a GAAP basis was $132 million or $1.15 per common share, while income from continuing operations excluding noteworthy items was $131 million or $1.15 per common share this quarter up from $125 million or $1 per common share last quarter. Compared to the year ago quarter although income from continuing operations excluding noteworthy items decreased 6%, it is up nearly 13% on a per share basis reflecting the reduction in share count as we continue to return capital to shareholders. Excluding noteworthy items, the increase in net income from the prior quarter primarily reflects lower operating and income tax expense and no semiannual preferred dividend paid in the quarter, partially offset by a decline in other noninterest income and a higher credit provision. Continued strong new business origination volume resulted in 2% average loan and lease growth in our core portfolio. In addition, prepayments moderated this quarter. Total average loans and leases were flat reflecting the impact of the sale of the reverse mortgage portfolio in May which was nearly $1 billion all with the continued roll off of the noncore portfolios. As a reminder our core portfolios include all commercial banking portfolios except NACCO and the other consumer lending portfolio within consumer banking. We have also included a page in the back of our earnings release to help you with this reconciliation. As shown on Slide 5 of the presentation, we have four noteworthy items within the continuing operations resulting from our strategic initiatives, although they mostly offset one another. Of note, this quarter we took a $16 million after tax impairment charge on the indemnification asset which represents the projected reimbursable losses due from the FDIC under our loss share agreement related to covered…

Thanks, John. In closing I want to reiterate that were encouraged by the steady progress we have made on our plan and remain committed to our return on tangible common equity goals. As you know, we were targeting 9.5% to 10% return on tangible common equity at the end of this year and 11% to 12% over the medium term. We remain committed to the pillars [ph] of our plan to maximize the potential of our core businesses, enhance our operational efficiency, optimize our funding costs, optimize our capital structure, and maintain strong risk management. With that, we’re happy to take your questions.

Thank you. [Operator Instructions] Our first question comes from Moshe Orenbuch of Credit Suisse. Please go ahead.

Great, can you hear me?

Yes.

Okay, great. Okay, sorry, just wondering if we could kind of talk a little bit, you kind of outlined some of the elements of the loan growth and maybe just talk a little bit about the competitive environment and what things you think are getting you that growth and how we should think about kind of margins into 2019 from your commercial loan portfolio?

Sure. I think that the growth is a reflection of a lot of the investments and repositioning that we've made in the business over the last couple of years. I mean, it's competitive out there, but we're continuing to be selective and disciplined despite the market conditions. We had 2% growth in our core businesses this quarter and 8% compared to last year, prepayments were down. I think in commercial finance the pipelines are encouraging, they remain strong and we've had good growth in healthcare, real estate, energy and aviation. We had some prepayments in quarter three not as severe as we had in some of the prior quarters, but just in general year-to-date we've funded about $3.1 billion in volume in that business. In real estate we really are very cautious there and very selectively growing the portfolio. In business capital we've had more technology additions in the business and in direct capital I think the vendor business showed good growth. We're seeing larger demand for larger equipment in commercial equipment finance and then in factoring we saw volumes up about 9% from the prior quarter last year, a lot of that is in the technology sector. And even consumer lending which is a very small base we saw growth in all of mortgage SBA in small business loans in CRA. So I think it's just reflecting the investments we've made in sales people and the technology that we're putting in the business. John, may be you want to comment on the margins?

Yes, so Moshe I think Ellen hit it right on the head. I mean if you look at where the growth is coming from, it's pretty much across the board. I think the one so far has been real estate where we've been very unwilling to compromise on terms and conditions and it's seen unprecedented levels of prepayments and this mentioned in the calls for new entrants coming into the space in the different products set. But in the C&I space, we're seeing good pockets of growth in even healthcare and energy across the business capital space, whether it’s equipment finance, director capital or capital equipment finance, they're literally hitting the cover of the bone as Ellen mentioned. It is due in part to some of the investments that she made in the business a couple of years back that's starting to bear fruit, some of the technology that's been invested in the business. In terms of margin, you would expect that as LIBOR started to move that we'd start to see some of the benefits. It has not been the case. So I think things are actually very tight. There is still an enormous amount of liquidity in the market. We've started to pass through in the second quarter and will continue to do in the third and potentially into the fourth quarter of this year and first quarter of next year some pricing increases, but we'll look at those in the context of the impact it has in volumes and so will be quickly kind of toggling back and forth. But so far what we've seen implemented in the second quarter into the third quarter has started to bear some modest fruit, but it takes a while to work through the entire portfolio and it's largely mostly in equipment finance and in direct capital elements of the business. Otherwise it's just really tight and if anything it's going to remain tight into the fourth quarter and potentially until something in the market goes bump in the night.

Got it and just as a followup John, you talked about some of the positive impacts of the balance sheet repositioning, can you talk about just the process for next year, I mean when will we hear about you know both capital and ability actions?

Yes, so when the capital front, we’ve actually had a few good conversations with the Fed. We're in the process of actually changing fed supervision teams. We're working through the process. I think we look at it from our side in terms of transitioning from SR 1518 and 1519 to SR 904. Yes, I would expect that obviously we've got to go through our planning process. We've got to get board consent, at the same time we're working through our budgeting process. I would expect on the fourth quarter earnings call in January we should be able to provide more visibility in terms of what it is that we'll be able to do on the capital front.

Perfect, thanks so much.

You’re welcome. Thanks Moshe.

Our next question comes from Eric Wasserstrom of UBS. Please go ahead.

Thanks very much. John, maybe if I can just build on Moshe's question for a moment, I'm just trying to make sure I understand all the dynamics that would be flying through the net interest margin over the next several quarters. So maybe it sounds like just to perhaps summarize what you just went through, core growth is good the end of the balance sheet maybe pivoting back towards a modest growth trajectory, but pricing remains competitive, is that basically the dynamic on the asset side of the equation?

Yes and it's in pocket, so it really it becomes very dependent in terms of the mix. So when you start to look at rail in the non-tank space, we're actually seeing some okay lift in terms of renewal pricing in the freight space. And as I said we'll see how the increases that we've put through in the business capital side of the business start to play through, but more generically I think yes that's exactly right what you said.

Okay, great and then maybe if we could just focus on the liability side for a moment because it sounds like there's a number of dynamics and I want to make sure I'm understanding them all fully. So there - the $45 million benefit that you talked to in the prepared commentary, did that capture the incremental $250 million of redemption that you are anticipating or is that only the TRS and the 150 announced on Friday?

No, it's everything.

It's everything okay. And so it sounds like the dynamic on the liability side is going to be those series of actions which looks to be about a 3 basis point benefit more or less of that in the ballpark?

The 3 basis points is a reference against what?

Just against your current net interest margin.

Yes, it could be I'd say 3 to 5 or that range.

And then the other, it sounds like the other significant dynamic will be the go forward benefit of incremental rail and well rail and just greater deposit funding from the core deposit channel and a lesser degree of dependence on the non-core deposit channels is that the other primary dynamic?

Yes, I mean that's a big part of it I mean to the extent that we can move away from wholesale funding in the holding company and avail ourselves of deposit based funding I think that’s quite valuable, so that 350 means a lot to us.

And then just finally the pricing, I guess that the beta effectively do you expect any change in beta as you move through like the next series of that action?

Yes, I think over the cycle I mean there is no question that we're going to continue to keep higher [ph] and we expect at some point we'll probably get between 60 and 70 or maybe a little bit more through the entire cycle. I think we've been fairly disciplined in terms of the way we manage pricing and if you look at our high set pricing or money market pricing or more broadly speaking just non-maturity deposits, we came out with 185 rate in February literally dragged our feet the entire year until October and then came out with a new saver rate of 215. So at the same time grew $3.5 billion deposits and added close to a 100,000 relationships or 65,000 to 70,000 relationships. So yes, the betas are clearly going to be a large driver in the net interest margin and the pacing at which it happens. And so far, I think everybody would probably uniformly talks about betas being somewhat lower than one might have expected the growth kind of all they got to see that frankly continue especially if the fed grows three or four times next year.

Thank you for taking all of my questions.

Not a problem.

Our next question comes from Chris Kotowski of Oppenheimer. [Audio Gap] A - John Fawcett Funding costs and deposits betas and PAA [ph] up until now has been pretty well behaved. We think identification asset is substantially behind us, but potentially a little far from that competition on pricing. I just think there are a lot of elements that can still potentially work the other way.

Okay and then just I want to make sure I had all the special items for the fourth quarter there's $30 million to $35 million gain on NACCO then there's a charge on the TRS of 70 to 75 and 15 to 20 on the unsecured debt, so we should be net, net something like a $55 million, $60 million net negative?

Yes, that's exactly right, yes, 30 to 35 on the sale of NACCO TRS pretax 70 to 75 and then debt extinguishment plus pretax of 15 to 20, so 55, 60 yes.

Okay and then just more on future capital actions, obviously I mean you've been making rapid progress on this share buyback, but I take it for the future we should not think of capital action as necessarily as a onetime thing that's announced just in June, it's kind of an ongoing process with you and the regulators and you're not tied to the CCAR process anymore in anyway?

We're not, but however we're continuing to be supervised by the fed and the OCC. And as John mentioned before we have new guidance under SR094 which really requires that a bank holding company still has to serve as a source of financial strength for its subsidiaries. So we're going to take very careful consideration on capital based on our market conditions, earnings, and capital needs, et cetera, and I would say that our guidance if we want to get to the 9.5% to 10% return on tangible common equity in the medium term is that we're going to have core Tier I ratio somewhere in the 11.5% to 12% range.

And Chris the only thing I would add to that is the other dynamic is, I think there's a huge difference going from 14.5% common equity Tier I down to 12%, then it is going from 12% to 11%. So I think we're infinitely more mindful of the way we're going to orchestrate that with our board and with the regulators because that extra luxury [ph] is what is informally [ph] more complicated I think than the 250 that we've just taken out of the last year and a half.

Okay, so how much of it look for more of a glide path down.

Yes, and the glide path has always been in the mix. I mean there is no step change.

Right, okay. That's it from me.

Thanks Chris.

[Operator Instructions] Our next question comes from Scott Valentin of Compass Point. Please go ahead.

Good morning. Thanks for taking my question. John, you mentioned the pipeline was good going into 4Q, is there any way you can kind of without or probably you won't give a number, but relative to other quarters higher or lower is there any way you can give may be some quantification around that?

It is it's just strong. I just Scott, I think the real wild card in the fourth quarter is going to be level of prepayments. I think we feel really good where we're sitting in terms of commercial financing need to expect that, there might be the same level of growth in the fourth quarter as you've seen in the third quarter. I think business capital which encompasses equipment finance, direct capital and capital equipment finance, those guys are just hitting the cover off the ball and there is no indication that anything is moving backwards there and so that pipeline remains very strong. I think commercial real estate it feels like as much as they put on that's as much is prepays and comes out of the book. So I think the driving story is going to be around business capital. Now what I would say is that if you looked over the last five or seven quarters, the fourth quarter of 2017 was probably our strongest quarter in 10 quarters coming up to that. Yes, and we'll see what happens in this fourth quarter, but it feels going into we're in a pretty good place.

Yes, I just want to reiterate, we had our best August in the company's history in business capital, lots of good momentum there, but as John said it's the level of prepayment that we can't predict. I also want to point out that usually in the last quarter we have the seasonal factor in our factoring business. So were going in at the continued pace that we've been at, but you just never know.

Okay, that's helpful. Thank you. And then just on credit it was stable this quarter, you're seeing some ripples out there. I'm just wondering if you see any changes in your watch list or maybe your sector focus is maybe where you are allocating capital away from certain sectors?

No, we're not really seeing any industry or secular trend that would indicate anything abnormal here. I think our third quarter provision was kind of in line with our guidance and charge offs at 35 points are still at near cycle loads. So we're not seeing any pockets of weakness or any patterns here and any increase in reserves we've had has really been in relation to the new business volume that we have been booking.

Okay, thanks very much.

Thanks Scott.

This concludes our question-and-answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to management for any closing remarks.

Thank you Nicole, and thank you everyone for joining us this morning. If you have any followup questions, please feel free to contact me or any member of the Investor Relations team. You can find our contact information along with other information on CIT in the investor relations section of our website at cit.com. Thank you again for your time and have a great day.

That concludes today's call. Thank you for participating.