RF
#Chris, we certainly are very analytical and disciplined about how we focus on acquisitions.
Quite frankly, our primary focus has been on bolt-on acquisitions in the non-bank space.
2015, we did two relatively small transactions that you're familiar with.
We continue to look at the marketplace, and we still think there's opportunities in both our wealth segment as well as our capital markets segment and insurance segments for bolt-on acquisitions.
We continue to look.
I think the expectation is these are going to be relatively small in size, and still at this juncture we're ---+ valuations are that predominantly our interest is in the non-bank space.
As markets change, we always reconsider.
So markets change, we try to analyze what the changes are and see where the opportunities are.
We looked at a lot of different scenarios, <UNK>, in terms of committing to the 2% to 4% or at least indicating if we could get to 2% to 4% operating leverage, there are a lot of different scenarios.
We believe through our expectations of revenue growth and our expectations of expense management that we will get there.
The combination of how we get there may change, and we will adjust, adapt and overcome.
But our goal is to generate that positive operating leverage regardless of the environment.
<UNK>, so we did say we were looking at 100 to 150 branches.
We said we would probably be towards the upper end of that through our strategic planning period.
We've announced 29.
We continue to look each and every day at how to best optimize our branch footprint, which has included even growing some ---+ opening some new ones at times.
But it's hard to get the cadence down to give you that commitment up front because it's all facts and circumstances based.
We have to look at our footprint, what's going on in the footprint.
We have a lot of coordination that has to happen.
What I can tell you is so we had a $6 million charge on the 29 branches that we closed or made a decision on consolidating this quarter.
There will be another roughly $6 million associated with those branches, so it's ---+ call it $12 million.
And we expect a payback on that of about two years, which is what we've had historically.
So all branches aren't created equal.
They're all a little different.
If you go back and look at all of our branch consolidations, it will give you a feel for what that charge might be over time.
But it's hard for me to give you precise timing.
No, at this juncture we just have not seen deposit rate pressures.
Given such a fairly modest increase in rates, the pressure from any part of our depository base has been very muted.
We continue to watch very closely what our competitors are and watch very closely what our customers are saying to us.
But quite to the contrary, we continue ---+ you saw this quarter ---+ to grow deposits and in fact grow low cost deposits at a pretty healthy pace.
And so we're just not seeing ---+ we're not seeing that particular issue arise at this juncture.
Sure.
This is <UNK>.
As <UNK> mentioned, one of our strategic initiatives is to diversify our revenue, and in this context diversification, is away from NII and into NIR.
As we think about the desire to diversify and we think about how we can have a more fulsome offering to our customers, things in capital markets come to mind.
You saw our acquisition of BlackArch Partners, our M&A advisory firm.
We looked at insurance entities.
We will continue to do that, agencies, continue to expand there.
We would like to have a more solid offering in fixed income sales and trading, so we're looking there.
And I think that these acquisitions have a tendency to be smaller acquisitions, but they fit into our need and our desire to continue to diversify and we think fit very well with our strategy.
And really serve ---+ they fit a customer need.
Trying to identify the needs that our customers have and how we can serve those better, but at the same time, to <UNK>'s point, diversify our revenue.
But we make sure that these are incremental in nature, bolt-on acquisitions that don't ---+ that have a risk profile that we feel like is prudent.
And so I think you can see us ---+ you should expect us to continue to look at those opportunities over 2016, but our primary focus as you've seen is on organic growth in the markets we're in today with the services we have today.
But this is in addition to that.
But primary focus is organic growth.
Well, so we got a lot of work going on with CCAR to be prepared for our submission in April.
We look at a lot of different portfolios.
I think from a credit standpoint, we mentioned earlier that ex energy, our credit portfolios are actually improving.
That works one way in terms of the CCAR submission.
Energy clearly needs to be taken into account.
<UNK> laid out some of the stresses that we're seeing and how we will account for those.
From our standpoint, we have one of the strongest levels of Common Equity Tier 1 of our peer group.
We did return 93% of our earnings to our shareholders, which we think was appropriate.
And as a result, we didn't want to continue to accrete capital because we felt like we had enough capital to run our business in a prudent manner.
We look at our stresses all the time, not just from a CCAR standpoint.
We do that for ourselves to make sure we're managing and optimizing our capital in our Company so that we have enough in times of stress, and ---+ but not too much in terms of ensuring we can have an appropriate return to our shareholders.
So exactly how all this will manifest itself in CCAR we will have to see and let the ---+ we run a lot of programs.
We will just need to see what the results are.
We don't see anything drastically different than what we have submitted before, ex-energy.
Thank you.
Well, with that, we stand adjourned.
Thank you for your participation and we look forward to next quarter.
