Good day, and welcome to the Renasant Corporation 2020 second quarter earnings conference call and webcast. All participants will be in listen-only mode. Should you need assistance, please signal a conference specialist by pressing the star key followed by zero. After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. To ask a question, you may press star and then one on your telephone keypad. To withdraw your question, please press star, then two. Please note this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Kelly Hutcheson of Renasant Corporation. Please go ahead.
Thanks, Allison. Good morning, and thank you for joining us for Renasant Corporation's 2020 second quarter webcast and conference call. Participating in this call today are members of Renasant executive management team. Before we begin, please note that many of our comments during this call will be forward-looking statements, which involve risk and uncertainty. There are many factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from the anticipated results or other expectations expressed in the forward-looking statements. Obviously, the continuing impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, the federal, state, and local measures taken to arrest the virus, as well as all of the follow-on effects from this pandemic situation, are the most significant factors that will impact our future financial condition and operating results.
Other factors include, but are not limited to, interest rate fluctuations, regulatory changes, portfolio performance, and other factors discussed in our recent filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including our recently filed earnings release, which has been posted to our corporate site, renasant.com, under the Investor Relations tab in the News & Market Data section. Furthermore, the COVID-19 pandemic has magnified and likely will continue to magnify the impact of these factors on us. We undertake no obligation, and we specifically disclaim any obligation to update or revise forward-looking statements to reflect changed assumptions, the occurrence of unanticipated events, or changes to future operating results over time. In addition, some of the financial measures that we may discuss this morning may be non-GAAP financial measures. A reconciliation of the non-GAAP measures to the most comparable GAAP measures can be found in our earnings release.
Now I'll turn the call over to Renasant Corporation Executive Chairman, Robin McGraw.
Thank you, Kelly. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. The second quarter marked our first full quarter operating during the pandemic. Later in our prepared remarks, we'll discuss in greater detail how the pandemic has affected our operations, but it's important to first highlight the unity of our teams and our response to meet the needs of our clients and our communities. The selfless efforts of our entire team at every level and across our footprint to support not only our clients, but also one another as the virus spread throughout our communities, it has been truly remarkable. Our success this quarter is directly attributable to the countless hours of hard work and dedication of our teams, and we commend their service and their loyalty to the company and our communities. There's no doubt the COVID-19 outbreak had a material impact on our second quarter results.
Our net income for the quarter was $20.1 million, which represents basic and diluted earnings per share of $0.36. Our net income included $5 million in after-tax expense specifically attributable to the pandemic. These expenses reduced our diluted EPS by $0.09. Because we cannot accurately predict the depth and length of the economic impact resulting from the pandemic and the government's response thereto, during the second quarter, we recorded an additional $26.9 million in provision for credit losses and another $2.6 million to our reserve for unfunded commitments. On a year-to-date basis, we have recorded $53.3 million in provision for credit losses and added $6 million to our reserve for unfunded commitments.
In addition to the impact of our COVID-19 related expenses and our enhanced provisions, we recorded a negative valuation adjustment to our mortgage servicing rights of $4 million on an after-tax basis, which reduced our diluted EPS by $0.07. Excluding these items, our diluted EPS for the quarter was $0.52. Looking through the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and these other items in our results, we had a solid second quarter, and our results not only highlighted the diversity of our revenue streams, but also reflect our commitment to support our clients and our communities, even through these turbulent times. Despite a compressed timeframe, our team designed and executed a process that allowed us to originate over $1.3 billion in loans under the Paycheck Protection Program. Through the end of last week, we have processed over 127,000 Economic Impact Payments.
We believe Renasant played an instrumental role in providing the capital and liquidity required by existing clients in a time of great need, and we hope that we've gained the trust and respect of our new clients as a result of our hard work and diligence during the government stimulus roll-outs. Our regulatory capital ratios strengthened quarter-over-quarter and all exceeded the minimum requirements to be considered well capitalized. I'll remind you that we suspended our stock repurchase program during the first quarter of 2020. Although there's $5.5 million of repurchase availability under the program, we currently do not foresee a situation where the program would be restarted before its expiration in October of 2020. We're committed to maintaining a strong capital and liquidity position while also serving the needs of each of our stakeholders during these uncertain times.
We believe our continued efforts to effectively manage the growth and profitability of our core business in light of the economic pressures we face will continue to preserve shareholder value. I'll turn the call over to our President and Chief Executive Officer, Mitch Waycaster, to discuss in greater detail this quarter's financial results and the impact of COVID-19 pandemic. Mitch?
Thank you, Robin. I'll echo Robin's remarks on the efforts of our team in response to the pandemic. Our employees are advocates for our company. They take personal pride in the company and champion our products and services. Our employees are exceptional. They execute with excellence and go above and beyond with every interaction. These past several months have been no different. As one team, our employees across our entire footprint and in the back office have provided critical services to our clients, many of whom are experiencing the economic impact of the pandemic. Our employees' efforts over these past several months have been truly extraordinary, and we applaud their service and commitment.
As Robin mentioned, we have been an active participant in the Paycheck Protection Program, originating over $1.3 billion in loans to help provide relief to small businesses thus far, and we continue to make Triple P loans to this day. Our approach has been high touch and intentional, which we believe is the driver behind our success. Our reputation for quality service garnered positive media attention. We originated 30% of our loans by dollar value to new clients. Through the date of this call, we have originated over 11,000 loans and generated more than $45 million in gross fees. Renasant has remained open for business throughout the pandemic. Although we closed our branch lobbies to regular traffic on March 20, and all of which remain closed, we believe our clients have not experienced any meaningful interruptions in service.
All drive-throughs at our branches remain open, and our mobile and online banking products provide alternative means for our clients to satisfy many of their banking needs. We are a community bank when it comes to customer service, but we also have a robust suite of digital and online products that, in our view, rivals any of our larger competitors. We believe that this has set us apart and gives us a competitive advantage in this environment. We continue to monitor the spread of the virus throughout our communities and will consider the advice of medical and regulatory experts prior to reopening our branch lobbies. The health and well-being of our associates and our clients is our highest priority and will drive our decision-making with respect to the reopening of our branch lobbies.
Although much of our time and effort in recent months have been focused on our response to the pandemic, we have not lost sight of our strategic plan and growth of our core operations. We closed the quarter with total assets of $14.9 billion as compared to $13.4 billion at December 31, 2019. Total loans held for investment were $11 billion at the end of the quarter as compared to $9.7 billion at December 31, 2019. Included in our loan balance at the end of the quarter is $1.28 billion in PPP loans. We have utilized on-balance sheet liquidity for our funding needs, which is a testament to our team's focus on growing a stable source of low-cost deposits. Total deposits were up $1.7 billion from the previous year-end, with growth in non-interest-bearing deposits accounting for $1.3 billion of the increase.
Although it is difficult to specifically link deposit dollars to PPP loan proceeds, we estimate that in excess of $600 million of our growth in non-interest-bearing deposits is attributable to PPP loans with the remainder of the increase generated from EIP deposits and core growth. Regardless of the interest rate environment, non-interest-bearing deposits enhance the core profitability of the company, and they will continue to be the preferred source of funding for our growth. While the long-term economic impacts from the pandemic are still very uncertain, we remain committed to meeting the needs of our clients and staying nimble in this rapidly changing environment. We remain focused on prudently managing our balance sheet as the pandemic and its economic effects evolve, and we remain committed to profitable growth without sacrificing credit quality. I mentioned earlier an exceptional team.
We announced yesterday another exceptional leader will join our management team. Effective August 1st, Jim Mabry will join Renasant Corporation and Bank as its CFO. Jim brings a wealth of financial experience, knowledge of our markets, and familiarity with our company. We are fortunate to have him join our outstanding management team. Kevin Chapman has served our company well as CFO over the past two years as both CFO and COO. As Jim joins our company, this will allow Kevin to expand his role in strategic leadership, devoting his full attention to Chief Operating Officer. The company has made great strides in refining and enhancing our internal and customer-facing experiences under Kevin's strategic leadership. Now I'll turn the call over to Kevin for additional discussion of our financial results. Kevin?
Thank you, Mitch. Good morning, everyone. Let me first start by echoing Mitch's remarks about Jim. As a growing financial institution, we believe Jim is the right person to help us continue to execute on our strategic plan. We're excited to welcome Jim and have him head our talented finance team. He brings great leadership, an extensive background, and a passion for mentoring. In talking about our numbers, for the second quarter, we reported net interest income of approximately $106 million, which was down $800,000 quarter-over-quarter. Net interest income attributable to PPP loans was just under $6 million for the quarter. Accretable yield recognized on purchased loans and interest income collected on problem loans was down $600,000 from the prior quarter. Our reported net interest margin was 3.38% for the second quarter of 2020 as compared to 3.75% for the first quarter.
Core margin, as we have historically defined it, which excludes accretable yield on purchased loans and income collected on problem loans, decreased 33 basis points on a linked quarter basis. Included in this core margin decline is the effect of PPP loans and excess liquidity, both of which weighed on margin during Q2. PPP loans negatively impacted margin by 5 basis points during the quarter, and excess on-balance sheet liquidity impacted margin by another 15 basis points. Combined, both of them affected core margin 20 basis points. In order to offset the effect of the Fed's rate cuts on our core loan yields, we took aggressive action to reduce interest-bearing deposit rates during the first half of the year. Our cost of total deposits was 49 basis points for the second quarter, a 23 basis point decline quarter- over- quarter.
With over $2 billion of time deposits, public funds, and money market commitment terms maturing over the next eight quarters at an average rate of 1.4%, we are confident in our ability to continue to reduce our funding costs in order to mitigate the pressure on the asset yields. Non-interest income continues to be a great source of income for us. Our mortgage division, which had a record quarter, effectively provided a hedge to our traditional loan portfolio in today's interest rate environment. During the quarter, our locked volume was $1.7 billion, driving gross mortgage banking income, excluding a $5 million pre-tax mortgage servicing rate valuation adjustment of $50 million. Refi volume accounted for 50% of production during the second quarter, compared to 50% in Q1. It is worth mentioning that we experienced a decline of about $2 million in overdraft fees during the quarter.
We attribute this to increased customer liquidity generated by the various stimulus plans and programs, and an overall decrease in consumer spending as shelter-in-place and similar government restrictions were opposed across the country. We anticipate this fee income will return as local economies begin to reopen and consumer spending resumes. Our non-interest income continues to be impacted by the limitations on our interchange fees imposed by the Durbin Amendment, which reduced fees and commissions on loans and deposits by approximately $3 million during the second quarter when compared to the same quarter last year. Non-interest expense was just over $118 million for the quarter and includes $2.6 million in provision related to our unfunded commitments. During the quarter, we recorded $6.3 million in pre-tax expense attributable to our COVID response.
$5.8 million of this expense is related to salaries and benefit expenses, such as overtime, recognition awards, and accruals for anticipated health and life expenses. The remainder of the expense is attributable to supplies, signage, and other preparedness-type expenses. I previously mentioned that our mortgage division had a record quarter. The continued elevated production during the quarter drove an increase in related compensation costs for mortgage of $3.2 million as compared to the first quarter. After these considerations, non-interest expense decreased on a linked quarter basis. We are continuously reviewing our expense base for cost savings and efficiency gains to help mitigate the impact to our net income from any revenue headwinds that we may have. Shifting our attention to credit quality, at the end of the second quarter, our asset quality metrics remained stable and actually improved slightly from the first quarter.
Our annualized net charge-offs were 6 basis points of average loans in Q2, and we have yet to see any unusual trends in our non-performing loans. In fact, our loans 30 - 89 days past due were only 10 basis points of total loans in Q2, which was down from 37 basis points at the end of Q1. Our approach to credit monitoring during the second quarter remains unchanged from our approach from previous quarters. Our early identification of portfolio concentrations that may be more adversely affected by the pandemic has proven to be true. We continue to tightly monitor our clients in the hospitality, restaurant, entertainment, and certain sectors of the retail trade industries.
We have removed the convenience store and transportation industries from our categorization of high risk, as these portfolios have benefited from recent economic activity, and we expect the loan deferral percentages of both categories to decline significantly as initial deferrals expire and are not renewed. In connection with our earnings release filing with the SEC, we have furnished supplementary information on each of these industries and provided credit metrics and performance statistics as of July 24th. Our exposure to each of these industries on an individual basis is less than 10% of our entire portfolio, and our exposure to these industries collectively is just over 15%. We mentioned in our first quarter call that we offered relief programs to our qualified commercial and consumer customers, and we are tracking these deferrals by industry and loan type.
As of June 30th, around 22% of our loan portfolio was deferred under one of these programs. As of July 24th, around 14% of our loan portfolio was still under deferral. Our deferral programs remain available, we plan to utilize if the borrower meets our underwriting criteria. To reiterate our criteria, deferral under these programs were made available to our borrowers who were in good standing prior to the pandemic. Even though we focused on these specific portfolios, because we cannot accurately predict the impact of the pandemic and the related economic interruption, we are continuing to monitor all asset categories for signs of deterioration. Looking specifically at our high-risk portfolios, we experienced decreases in the deferral percentages of each category as of July 24th compared to June 30th.
In his remarks, Robin mentioned our provisioning for the quarter. We continue to take the position that a credit event occurred in Q1, and there continues to be uncertainty of the actual cost or losses and magnitude of this event. As such, we believe it to be prudent to continue to bolster our reserves in response to the uncertainty, and therefore recorded a provision for loan losses of $26.9 million and increased our reserve for unfunded commitments by $2.6 million. Our allowance at the end of the quarter represents 150 basis points of total loans when you exclude Triple P loans, and our coverage ratio of allowance to non-performing loans was 330% at the end of the quarter. For more detailed information on our financials, I'll refer you to our press release, our SEC filing supplement for specific numbers or ratios.
I'll pass the call back to Robin for any closing comments.
Thank you, Kevin. I'd also like to welcome Jim Mabry to our team. Jim is an old friend who has worked closely with us in the past. We're happy to have him as part of the Renasant team. I'm also pleased to see Kevin have this opportunity to expand his role as our Chief Operating Officer. He's been an integral part of our success and deserves this expanded role. In closing, the uncertainty that existed heading into the second quarter still remains as we begin the third quarter. We are unable to accurately predict the long-term impact of the virus and the continuing limitations on our economic activity, what they will have on our shareholders.
Our commitment to the safety and security of our employees, to understanding and then meeting the needs of our clients, and then being good citizens in the communities, will support our success through this cycle and ultimately provide value to our shareholders. Allison, I'll turn the call back over to you for Q&A.
Thank you, sir. We will now begin the question-and-answer session. To ask a question, you may press star and then one on your telephone keypad. If you are using a speakerphone, please pick up your handset before pressing the keys. To withdraw your question, please press star, then two. Once again, it is star and then one to ask a question. Our first question today will come from Jennifer Demba of SunTrust. Please go ahead.
Thank you. Good morning.
Good morning, Jennifer.
Just a few questions. First of all, can you just talk about what your loan growth outlook is over the next couple of quarters, Mitch, and what you're seeing in your pipeline?
Sure. Jennifer, I'll begin with a discussion of the pipeline and how we have seen that build in the last several weeks. Comment on what we could expect given that pipeline in production in the quarter. I'll reflect some on the production that we saw in Q2 in addition to PPP. Beginning with the pipeline, the current pipeline is $229 million. That compares to $177 million the prior quarter. If we were to go back about three weeks, that $229 million would then in the range of $190 million. If we would go back six weeks, it would be in the $160 million range. As you can see, we've continued to see pipeline build, particularly as we saw things reopen earlier in the quarter.
Considering the pandemic, we continue to see a good, but what I would call cautious deal flow across each of the markets and business lines. If I break that down, that current pipeline of 229, 24% would be in Tennessee, 11% in Alabama, Florida Panhandle, 12% in Georgia, Central Florida, 13% in Mississippi, and about 40% in our corporate and commercial business lines. If you take the 229, you could expect about $68 million growth and non- purchase within 30 days. Also taking the current pipeline, it would be indicating production this quarter more in the $550 million-$600 million range. Which would indicate low to mid single-digit net growth. I would follow that by saying, until we begin to see sustained resolution of the pandemic, it's very difficult to give that guidance.
With that being said, let's just focus a minute on the production we did see in Q2. That pipeline that I just mentioned does not include any current PPP transactions, nor does the $521 million that we produced in Q2. We had $521 million in production outside of $1.3 billion, as Robin and I mentioned in our comments during the quarter. That $521 compares to $516 million in the first quarter. It compares to $349 million, same period prior year. The $521 led to about $122 million in non-acquired growth or about 6% annualized. We did see an elevation in payoffs of over the last four quarter average of about $2,025 million. Also, we saw some reduction in line utilization. Both of those things weighed on what resulted in a net of flat to slightly down in net growth.
I will say, too, the production of $521, we continue to see, as we do in the pipeline, good production across our markets and across our business lines. Also relative to the talent that's joined the company in the last several quarters. In Q2, that group produced right at 21% of that production.
That's helpful . Thank you. My other question is on criticized loans. Can you talk about the trends you saw in the second quarter?
Sure. Jennifer, hi, this is David Meredith. Second quarter, we didn't see a material degradation of our loan portfolio. We did have two larger downgrades in Q2. They were already assets that we had identified on the watch list pre-COVID that were just slightly more impacted by COVID. One was a retail shopping center, and one was a senior housing portfolio. Our classified assets are about 1.4% of our loan portfolio at this time, up slightly from Q1, due primarily to those two loans. We have not seen a tremendous reflection in our asset quality at this point. We'll obviously continue to be mindful of it as we do our enhanced monitoring on loans and deferral and increase our portfolio monitoring. At this point, we've not seen that relate to classified asset increase.
Okay. Thank you.
Thank you, Jennifer.
Our next question today is from Brad Milsaps of Piper Sandler. Please go ahead.
Hey, good morning, guys.
Morning, Brad.
Morning, Brad.
Thanks for taking my questions. Kevin, wanted to see if we could maybe start on the expense side of the equation. You talked about the $6.3 million of COVID related costs in the quarter. Just curious if there was also any benefit going the other way from FAS 91 deferred origination costs. I know those hurt you in the first quarter. Just kind of curious with all the PPP lending this quarter if there was any benefit there. Just trying to get a sense of kind of expense run rate as you get into the back half of the year.
Yeah, Brad, there was a little bit of a benefit. It was attributable to the PPP. The difference in FAS 91 expense in Q2 compared to Q1 was a benefit of about $2 million. There's a little bit of a pickup there. Even if you factor that in with all the other moving parts that we had, the expense run rate's trending down. As we've mentioned, if we kind of look through what's happening in mortgage or look through what's happening in COVID, this was true in Q1, it'll be true in Q2. It's true in Q2. It'll be true in Q3. Salaries and employee benefit will continue to decline. Our expectation will continue to decline. We will be opportunistic in our hiring. We're also using this as an opportunity to reconstitute or provide better levels of accountability.
We're expecting that trend line to decline. If you look at our other items, data processing, occupancy and equipment, all of those items were flat or declining during the quarter. Again, we're looking at any property, any contract, anything, to ensure that it's hitting our internal profitability metrics, that it is achieving any of our projections that we thought or that we modeled in making our decision. If it's not, we're challenging it and looking to either increase the performance of that decision or look at exiting that decision, whether it's a contract or a property or, in some cases, a hire. We'll continue to be mindful of expenses and look at that with urgency. We recognize that we could continue to have revenue headwinds, and we've got to look for the offsets on the expense side.
As we look at Q3, again, we expect mortgage to have a good quarter in Q3. Continue to have elevated expenses related to mortgage and their production. We'll probably have some more COVID-19 expenses in Q3, just looking at our states that we operate in and the high concentration of positive tests. We are expecting continued expenses from COVID-19. If we look through that, the core expenses should be trending down.
Great. That's helpful. Then just on PPP, I think you disclosed you had gross fees of $44.7 million. Just kind of curious what you recognized, in this quarter, as a portion of the interest income that you disclosed and then how much you have left remaining to recognize on a net basis.
It may take me one minute to get the amount of the income that was interest income as opposed to fee recognition. I'll tell you, just as we look at how we're recognizing these fees, they are capitalized. They're viewed as a discount against that loan portfolio, and it's being amortized over the contractual maturity of the loan. For the most part, 99% of the loans that we originated were originated with a two-year expected contractual life. We're amortizing this over two years. We are expecting a significant amount of these loans to be forgiven. When the forgiveness happens, who knows? That's a target that continues to move and be extended. We are expecting that these would be forgiven, and once they're forgiven, all that unrecognized fee will be collected back into income.
We are amortizing it over the contractual maturity, which will be two years. Breaking down the $6 million of the benefit from the PPP Program in Q1, about $3 million-$3.5 million were tied to the fees, recognition of amortizing the fee back into income. The remainder would just be the stated interest income of 1%.
Okay, great. Just final question, just on the mortgage, obviously, tremendous performance this quarter. Can you give us a little more color, apologize if I missed it, just on production in the second quarter versus the first, maybe gain on loan sale margin, kind of what impact that had, if any, on a linked quarter basis on how that changed?
Sure. I'll make a couple comments and turn it over to Jim. We continue to have strong levels of production. Our mortgage group, they locked about $1.7 billion. I think that was actually slightly down from Q1. I think Q1 was about $1.8, $1.9. The margin expanded, the significant increase in the fees was really a margin play, just heavy volume, but also the margin expanded, and that's what caused the pop in the mortgage income. Jim, any further details?
Just kind of looking into the third quarter, our volumes through July, daily lock volumes have continued to be strong, very similar to what we experienced in the second quarter. Margins have stayed really strong. We have to monitor what our competition is doing, and particularly on the wholesale side, have had to pull back a little bit on margins, but then we've been able to put them back in, and really that's a day-to-day thing that we look at. Looking right now at the third quarter based on July performance, we'd expect to see similar results to the second quarter.
Okay, great. Thank you, guys.
I will make one comment. Looking at our purchase refi volume, as noted in the release, we were roughly 58% refi in the first quarter, 50% refi in the second quarter. What we're seeing now in the third quarter, we're running more about 45% refi. Purchase continues to increase, and has consistently increased over the year, and we anticipate that continuing.
Our next question today will come from Michael Rose of Raymond James. Please go ahead.
Hey, guys. Thanks for taking my questions. Wanted to follow up on the mortgage. If I add back the MSR impairment, looks like mortgage revs are about 29%, roughly, of total revenue this quarter. Can you give us a sense for what the efficiency of that business looks like? As that mix continues to evolve into next year, using the MBA's forecast, that should come down. What areas on the expense side can you look to offset some of the impact from what I would expect to be declining revenue from mortgage next year? Thanks.
Sure. Just looking at the efficiency of mortgage with the volume that they had, or maybe as a backdrop. Typically, mortgage, before Q1 and Q2, their efficiency ratio runs in the about 70%-75% range. Right now, they're a little bit more efficient with all the volume that they've had. It's more in that 60%-65% range. As we look ahead and recognize that every year that we forecast, we forecast declining revenues coming out of mortgage because it's just cyclical, and that's just the nature. We just anticipate it to be down. One day we'll be right about that. We've been more wrong about that over the past five years, one day we'll be right. What do we do? I think the question is what do we do to reduce our dependence on mortgage? I don't think it's only on the expense side.
There are levers to pull on the expense side, and we've discussed some of those, whether it's the salaries, employee benefits, whether it is looking at property, whether it's looking at every contract, but there's also opportunity on the revenue side. Mentioned what's happening on the service charges. Service charges on linked quarter basis are down $2.2 million. That annualizes close to $10 million of revenue that's currently out of the run rate, if you just annualize the current run rate. We expect that to come back to us, and that's a pretty efficient revenue stream. There's a significant amount of upfront costs, but every dollar above that upfront cost is pretty efficient. The other is going to come through other small wins in whether it's preserving margin, whether it is small incremental balance sheet growth, whether it's larger incremental balance sheet growth.
It's going to come through singles and doubles as to how we mitigate and drive and improve profitability by pulling multiple levers on the expense side, on the revenue side, some cases on the growth side. Those are the levers that we're going to pull if and when the tide of mortgage rolls out of the revenue stream.
Michael, one other thing, Mitch, one other thing I will mention. As you know, we've been very opportunistic, just hiring on relationship managers and really in every cylinder of this company, whether it's retail, small business, commercial specialty, corporate. Last year, we had an intense focus there. That focus continues this year. We've had 18 additions. At the same time, you've heard us, back to Kevin's point, our intentionality around and expectations around production that drives revenue. It drives production, the focus on pricing, underwriting. What we've seen this year, as we continue to add talent, and as I mentioned, as we continue to drive loan production that I referred to earlier across all segments, we've also been intentional and actually have a net decrease of about seven this year in that group.
Again, staying very focused on having the right talent in the right markets, focused on growth, but focused on profitability.
That's very helpful. I appreciate the color. Maybe just to follow up, if you can talk about the margin. You mentioned the impact from the liquidity and the PPP loans. It sounds like there's some ability to actually improve the core margin here as some of that excess liquidity runs out, and it looks like you still have some room on the deposit cost side. The question becomes on the loan yields. How should we think about that core margin, in the near term? Thanks.
Yeah. Maybe let's define the core margin as we talk about it. What I'm going to mention kind of excludes all the excess liquidity in PPP, only because we're expecting in Q3, Q4 2021, PPP to drive more noise in the margin, just as we start to enter the forgiveness phase. Maybe if we kind of look through that. Do think there's going to be downward pressure, but real possibility for margin to stabilize as we reprice these high-cost time deposits that I mentioned. I mentioned that we've got $2.4 billion maturing over the next eight quarters. 75%-80% of that is maturing over the next four quarters. That's at an average rate of roughly a 130. We have about $1.8 billion of time deposits or negotiated public funds, money markets that'll be maturing, and it's a weighted average cost of a 130.
We're going to have the opportunity to reprice down to current market rates. That's going to provide a nice tailwind. We still have the headwinds of just being in a low-rate environment. Security portfolio yields are hard to come by. We'll continue to look to properly invest excess cash in loan growth. Again, it's going to have to meet our credit metrics and our underwriting, but continue the ways to deploy that cash. In the short term, we do have some tailwinds on the funding side as we continue to evaluate where the opportunities are on the asset side to deploy excess cash.
Off of that $322 in the second quarter, maybe flat to slightly up is the way I'm reading it based on your comments. Is that the way to think about it?
That's the way to think about it.
All right, guys. Thanks for taking my questions.
Thank you.
Thank you, Michael.
The next question will come from Kevin Fitzsimmons of D.A. Davidson. Please go ahead.
Hey, good morning, everyone.
Good morning, Kevin.
Morning, Kevin.
I'm just curious on the deferrals. It seemed like positive progress was made there. I'm just curious, is there any initial data points on second deferral requests and what you've seen so far on that?
There is, and I will mention just on where we stand as of Friday. We have more loans over the next 30 days that the first phase deferral will be expiring. We do anticipate that 14% to continue to migrate downwards. Again, I'm going to let David Meredith, our Chief Credit Officer, just talk about what they're seeing in second phase deferral, and also would ask him what the criteria are to qualify for a second phase deferral.
Sure. I'll start with that criteria. Just real quickly on phase I, Kevin mentioned earlier, it was basically helping those customers who were in good standing with the bank. We offered them the ability to defer P&I payments on the commercial side for 90 days. Phase II is a little more robust through the deferral process. Anybody who received a deferral had to have monthly monitoring of their loan to make sure we were in touch with the performance of the customer, loan migration, and so forth. Phase II deferral is a more detailed look at basically, is there a need? How the customer performed during the phase I deferral. Are there headwinds that are going to impact them to a subsequent deferral?
Do they have the cash flow to meet debt service payments, or are we properly aligned from a structural standpoint, whether that be the borrower also a guarantor, or are we collaterally in the right place and so forth. It's much more of a modification type than just purely another 90-day deferral.
Of the phase II. It's a lot more robust process in phase II. At this point, we have a fairly large percentage. If we look at our deferrals, it's roughly $2.1 billion. About $1.8 billion of that is commercial in nature, and we'll have a heavy phase I deferrals that mature in July. About $1.3 billion of that $1.8 billion mature in July. A lot of this is, what we're talking about is in process from looking at our customers and what the expectation is by having those monthly meetings between the customer and the lender. At this point, we only have couple of that have actually rolled into a phase II deferral, but much more color around it comes from those interviews where we're looking at who's going to potentially request a phase II deferral.
That number, at this point, will drop off materially. We expect, based on preliminary numbers, by the end of August, somewhere around that timeframe, that deferrals will drop to about no more than an 8% range based on those conversations with customers. We'll continue to see that migrate down through the end of Q3 and into Q4. We've got a fairly good feel by an industry standpoint, hospitality will continue to be a fairly heavy level of deferrals that need a second round. About 69% of that book of business will need a second-round deferral. It drops off pretty materially. Arts and entertainment need a 54% of that book will need a second look. Restaurants, about 16%. Healthcare, maybe about 25%.
So much more of this is a forward-looking than a historical look based on a heavy level of phase I deferrals in the month of July. Again, we expect positive trends into the month of August, hoping to get no more than 8% by the end of August.
Okay, great. That was very helpful. Just a quick follow-on. You guys had mentioned earlier in your prepared remarks how the credit event occurred in the first quarter, but in second quarter, there was this uncertainty, and that uncertainty continues going into third quarter. I know this is tough to pinpoint, but how should we think about further reserve building over the back half of the year with the allowance ratio now at one and a half? Some larger banks have surpassed 2%. Should we think about this kind of pace if we continue with this kind of uncertainty as far as the depth and the duration of the uncertainty? Thanks.
Yeah. Thanks, Kevin. Good question. The short answer, based on what we know today, would say, no, we do not anticipate this level of provisioning. Part of our factoring in of our assumptions for this quarter's provision was the reality that the five states we operate in, with the level of positive testing, is putting back into question whether or not there's going to be some type of either pullback or, maybe, again, this is all our presumption, but there could be pressure to pull back economic activity as a result of the heightened levels of increase in positive tests. What that leads to is a prolonged rather than more of a, well, we've never assumed a V, we assume more of a U-shaped recovery, but it's extending the length of that recovery specific to our five states.
That was the overriding factor that led to a higher level of provisioning this quarter. We tried to be severe in our assumptions. We tried to capture as much as we could in the uncertainty and try to quantify it to what the impacts would be, isolate that impact to the higher-risk loan categories, ensure those are adequately reserved. We'll just have to look at it as to where we stand at the end of Q3. Would not anticipate the level of provisioning we've had in Q1 and Q2 for the back half of the year. We do look at some of the peer information, and maybe it's worthwhile at this time to just remind that compared to some of our peers, we do not have energy exposure. We do not have credit card portfolio.
Therefore, I don't see us necessarily needing to get to the upper end of the peer group as it relates to allowance to loans. We look at it and we monitor it. We also recognize that we have some differences, at least what we view as some higher-risk loan categories that others may have a little bit more exposure to.
That's a fair point. Thanks, Kevin. Thanks, everyone.
Thank you.
Thank you, Kevin.
Our next question is from Matt Olney of Stephens. Please go ahead.
Hey, thanks. Morning, guys.
Morning, Matt.
Morning, Matt.
I want to circle back on loan growth, and we got a great update from Mitch on the pipelines. It sounds like they're seeing some nice builds in recent weeks. Can you talk about the challenge of converting these pipelines into loan fundings? As you talk to borrowers, are there any specific data points they're waiting to see that would actually move those from a pipeline into a loan funding? Thanks.
Yeah, Matt, good point. As I ended that discussion, I made mention until we begin to see some resolution, that one's hard to predict. Just thinking about the return that we saw earlier in the quarter, and then as numbers across our footprint in much of the country now, we're seeing those numbers increase. It's really a question of traction. That traction that really began earlier in the quarter, will the elevation of cases of late, how will that put a governor on what I described earlier? We do talk about that quite a bit internally, and as we talk about pipeline.
Deal flow has increased, particularly over the last several weeks. I can tell you when you reflect on the sentiment of clients, that question does remain. Back to Kevin's comments, as he was just talking about provisioning, there's some uncertainties out there. I talked about our production of $521 million. The current pipelines indicate probably production in that $550 million-$600 million. What you mentioned is pull-through, how many actually get across the finish line. It is very hard to determine. I can tell you overall sentiment remains good, across each of our business lines, markets, but with a sense of caution. Like I said, I don't know how to predict that one. It is good to see the deal flow. It's good to see the conversation.
I think, as we're being very prudent, as we underwrite, our clients are using that same prudence as they, in their mind, think about how they deploy capital, they increase debt. Hopefully that helps. It's definitely an unknown at this point.
Yeah, no, that's helpful, and it's definitely not an easy question to address at this point. Appreciate the commentary. Then I guess, taking a step back, thinking about the margin, interest-bearing deposit costs are now down to about 70 basis points, and it sounds like there's some nice momentum to move that down, from time deposit or pricing. If I go back four or five years, I think Renasant had an interest-bearing deposit cost in the high 20, low 30 basis point range. If we assume that rates just hold here for a while, do we think we can eventually get down to those levels? I'm just trying to understand if there's been any structural changes to the bank recently that would prevent something like that from occurring, if of course, rates were to stay here for a few years.
Yeah, no, you're exactly right. I think our deposit costs bottomed out maybe 2016. They bottomed out in about 2013, 2014, and they stayed at that bottom till about 2016, 2017, started to increase. It was in that low 20 basis point range, maybe close to 25 basis points. We do anticipate getting back down to that level, if not slightly lower, and particularly if we stay in this prolonged environment. Don't think that there's anything that would prevent us from doing that. Now, a lot from the change between now and where we bottom out, there's a lot of excess liquidity floating in the system. It makes it easy to say right now that absolutely we're going to get that rate down.
I think the challenge in front of us, and again, we operated in this environment for several years, in the recent past, we believe that we can get back to those levels, if not slightly lower. The confidence on the slightly lower piece is right now we have more non-interest bearing DDA funding our balance sheet than we did in 2012, 2013, that led us to those lower cost of deposits that you mentioned. Right now, our mix is more favorable, so the impact on the absolute cost should be slightly more favorable. We anticipate and are prepared to go down to those levels, just given where we are in the rate environment.
Okay. That's helpful. Thank you, guys.
Thank you, Matt.
Again, to ask a question, it is star and then one. Our next question is from Kathryn Mueller of KBW. Please go ahead.
Thanks. Good morning.
Morning, Kathryn.
Morning, Kathryn.
I just wanted to circle back on expenses, on a few follow-ups. First, on the COVID-related expenses, I know, Kevin, you mentioned that you think some of that will still be in the run rate into next quarter. I know it's hard to guess, but I guess my first question is, how much of that do you think sticks around, and how much of it was really just kind of a one-time investment that you had to do this past quarter that you won't see again? My second question, just on the expense topic, is on branch closures. You mentioned you're looking at everything to try to figure out how you reduce expenses in this low-revenue environment. Have you talked or thought about branch closures, and what are your thoughts on potential savings there?
All right. Let's talk COVID expenses first. I do think this quarter was a little bit elevated just on the COVID expenses. I'll give you an example. The amount of work and effort that was done in April and May to roll out either PPP or process the economic stimulus programs led to a lot of overtime. Again, Robin and Mitch talked about the dedication of the team. To just kind of amplify how dedicated they were, we had multiple teams working seven days a week, 12- 14-hour days, to implement these programs. We know we're not the only bank that this happened to, but it was truly an opportunity where people stood up and rolled out these programs and worked hard to figure it out, and we think successfully, helped get this money out to where it was intended.
That came with a cost, and that cost was overtime, or it was reward recognition. Overtime, for example, in Q2 compared to Q1, it was up over $1.5 million. Most of that occurring in April and May. I don't think we're going to replicate that in Q3 with the level of overtime, but that's just an example of what we saw. Again, the forgiveness phase, we don't think there's going to be a rush to the door for the forgiveness phase like we saw in Q1 with phase 1 of the application phase. There will be some time and effort. Again, with the new rules, it gives us more time. If they simplify forgiveness, then that takes a significant amount of burden off the system to have to process.
Therefore, we're not expecting having to work those 12-14-hour days for multiple weeks. That's just an example of some of the variables or the factors that could affect that COVID expense, overtime being one. On the branch closure, I would just go back, we're looking at anything and everything. Part of this is branch rationalization. I would say that we have been rationalizing branches for multiple years. In today's environment, we have to look even harder and challenge our assumptions about that branch, challenge our assumptions about any of our decisions in today's set of circumstances, as opposed to what we thought was going to happen based on what was happening in the past. I would say anything and everything right now is on the table for challenge, including that branch rationalization.
Don't know which or how many or if any, but all of those are on the table to evaluate. There's also ways to affect efficiency within the branch without closing it, through the adoption of technology, through the rollout of integrated teller machines. That can help the efficiency of the branch without actually closing the physical facility that it operates in.
Kathryn, I was going to add to Kevin's point, the last one he just made in particular. I think as an industry, and certainly at Renasant, we have to start with listening to the client and seeking to understand how they wish those services to be delivered. We're seeing changes. Adoption of online account opening, adoption of digital and online means to deliver services, especially during the pandemic. Even pre-pandemic, we saw customer desires, their interactions changing. I think as an industry, as a company, we continue to evaluate that and really determine what customer expectations are going forward and how will that impact us as a company and how we deliver our services. It's an opportunity, and also at the same time, staying focused on meeting client needs.
Ladies and gentlemen, this will conclude our question- and- answer session. At this time, I'd like to turn the conference back over to Robin McGraw for any closing remarks.
Thank you, Allison. We appreciate everyone's time and interest in Renasant Corporation and look forward to speaking with you again soon.
The conference is now concluded. We thank you for attending today's presentation, and you may now disconnect your lines.