NBT earnings dip slightly in Q4 and full 2022 year

NORWICH, N.Y. — NBT Bancorp, Inc. (NASDAQ: NBTB), parent company of NBT Bank, closed out a challenging year of volatile interest rates and weak stock and bond markets with a slight drop in profit for the year and final quarter. But the banking company is optimistic about the year ahead.

NBT, which ranks No. 3 in deposit market share in the 16-county Central New York region, posted fourth-quarter net income of $36.1 million, or 84 cents a share, down about 3 percent from $37.3 million, or 86 cents per share, in the year-ago quarter.

The banking company generated full-year 2022 net income of $152 million, or $3.52 per share, down nearly 2 percent from $154.9 million, or $3.54 a share, in the prior year.

“We achieved superior operating results for the full year 2022 defined by strong long growth in connection with our strategy to build scale and create higher operating leverage,” President/CEO John H. Watt, Jr. contended during a Jan. 24 conference call, discussing the earnings results with analysts and investors.

Highlights for the 2022 year include the Dec. 5 announcement that NBT will acquire Salisbury Bancorp, Inc., a 14-branch community bank headquartered in Lakeville, Connecticut, in an all-stock transaction expected to close in the second quarter of this year.

NBT also generated loan growth of 10.2 percent last year, pushed by a strong fourth quarter for the company’s commercial and residential solar lending portfolio, Watt said.

The banking company also saw a continued strong customer transition to digital services, with a 94 percent cumulative increase in consumer digital adoption since 2020, he noted.

Net interest income for the year grew to $362.2 million, up from $321.1 million a year earlier. Non-interest expenses totaled
$304.5 million, up from $287.3 million in 2021.

Chicago–based Zacks Equity Research, which noted in a Jan. 25 report that NBT’s stock declined about 15 percent over the prior four weeks with significant selling pressure, indicates things may be turning around and lists NBTB as a strong buy.

“The heavy selling could be in the process of exhausting itself, so the stock could bounce back in a quest for reaching the old equilibrium of supply and demand,” the report read. “A strong agreement among sell-side analysts covering NBTB in raising earnings estimates for the current year has led to an increase in the consensus EPS estimate by 1.6 percent over the last 30 days.”

In the first five trading days after that report, NBT’s stock bounced back, rising almost 7 percent, cumulatively.

For his part, Watt’s outlook is positive heading into 2023. 

“Across our markets, our commercial business banking customers are active and their sentiment is generally optimistic,” he says. Projects funded by a 2021 federal infrastructure bill are moving forward, and “our customers are bidding and winning their fair share.”

With the acquisition of Salisbury, NBT is positioning itself to be a strong player in the state’s “chip corridor” running from Syracuse to the Hudson Valley, and Watt predicts strong growth over the next five years along the corridor.

NBT Bank has 140 branches across New York, Vermont, Pennsylvania, New Hampshire, Maine, and Connecticut. NBT Bancorp also operates two financial-services companies. EPIC Retirement Plan Services, based in Rochester, is a national benefits-administration firm. NBT Insurance Agency, LLC, based in Norwich, is a full-service insurance agency.