NBT reports flat earnings in Q1, poised for future growth

NORWICH — NBT Bancorp Inc., (NASDAQ: NBTB), the parent company of NBT Bank, N.A., saw relatively flat earnings in the first quarter of 2024, reporting net income of $33.8 million, or 71 cents a share, compared to $33.7 million, or 78 cents per share in the year-ago quarter. “NBT reported solid results for the quarter despite the ongoing challenges presented by the interest-rate environment,” President/CEO John H. Watt Jr. said in NBT’s April 22 earnings report. “Our resilient balance sheet is the foundation that allows our team to execute on our growth strategies across our markets. Our fee-based businesses continue to grow, providing diversified revenue streams that generated 31 percent of total revenues.” The banking company generated net interest income of $95.2 million in the first quarter, up 0.1 percent from the first quarter of 2023, but down 4 percent from the fourth quarter of 2023. The quarter-over-quarter decrease stems from a decline in short-term interest-bearing accounts and the interest earned on those accounts, coupled with one less day in the first quarter of 2024 compared to 2023. Non-interest income at NBT increased by $6.8 million, or 18.7 percent, to hit $43.2 million in the first quarter of this year, compared to the first three months of 2023. NBT saw increases of $2.8 million in retirement-plan administration fees, $500,000 in wealth-management fees, and $700,000 in insurance-services income. Non-interest expenses increased to $91.8 million in this year’s first three months from $79.3 million a year prior, driven in part by an 11.4 percent increase in salary and benefit costs due to the bank’s 2023 acquisition of Salisbury Bancorp. Total interest expenses also increased during the first quarter to $51.8 million from $42.2 million in the first quarter of 2023. NBT repurchased 1,900 shares of its common stock during the quarter at an average price of $33.03 per share under a previously announced share-repurchase program. As of March 31, there were 1,998,100 shares available for repurchase under this plan. NBT’s stock price was down about 16 percent year to date as of trading at midday on April 24. Total deposits as of March 31, 2024, were $11.2 billion, an increase of $226.3 million from the $10.97 billion reported on Dec. 31, 2023. The increase stems mainly from an inflow of seasonal municipal deposits during the quarter, the report stated. “NBT is poised to participate in the transformational growth that will occur in our core upstate New York markets as the result of multiple game-changing investments in semiconductor manufacturing, including the recently announced $6.1 billion grant Micron Technology will receive under the CHIPS & Science Act that will, in part, support its plans to invest as much as $100 billion, over the next 10 years, in a new complex of semiconductor chip manufacturing plants near Syracuse,” Watt said. NBT Bancorp, a financial-holding company headquartered in Norwich, has total assets of $13.44 billion. The company operates through NBT Bank, with 154 branches in New York, Pennsylvania, Vermont, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Maine, and Connecticut. It also operates EPIC Retirement Plan Services, a national benefits-administration firm based in Rochester, and NBT Insurance Agency, LLC, a full-service insurance agency based in Norwich.