Glacier Bancorp, Inc. (NASDAQ:GBCI) Q3 2020 Earnings Conference Call - Final Transcript

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by. And welcome to the Glacier Bancorp Third Quarter Earnings Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] After the speakers' presentation, there will be a question-and-answer session.

[Operator Instructions] Please be advised that today's call is being recorded. [Operator Instructions] I would now like to hand the call over to Randy Chesler, President and CEO of Glacier Bancorp. Please go ahead.

All right. Thank you, Michelle, and good morning and thank you for joining us today. With me here in Kalispell this morning is Ron Copher, our Chief Financial Officer; Angela Dose, our Chief Accounting Officer; Byron Pollan, our Treasurer; and Tom Dolan, our Chief Credit Administrator. Don Chery, our Chief Administrative Officer is on the road this week, visiting our divisions and will not be joining us today.

Yesterday, we released our third quarter 2020 earnings and today we're ready to review the state of the company and the financial results. The third quarter results show another very solid performance from the Glacier team, and once again highlights the strong core of the Company and the strength of our team and our business model despite the stiff headwinds generated by the global COVID-19 pandemic and the related economic and social impacts.

COVID rates now appear to be spiking in some of our Western states and while most of our business operations remain uninterrupted, this is a circumstance that we're watching closely. We continue to navigate through the ongoing pandemic extremely well, and I'm exceptionally proud of the Glacier team, our senior staff at the holding company, as well as our 16 bank Presidents and their teams for their commitment and leadership and their service to their communities that they have demonstrated this year.

Despite the pandemic, we are amazed at how well our customers have adjusted to the circumstances and are carrying on with business. Our residential mortgage volume is at record levels with refinancing and new-home purchases, our commercial lending business is beginning to pick up and many of our business customers report they had a very good summer and early fall season. The performance of our loan portfolio continues to show that our conservative approach to credit really pays off during times like these. And we've seen some increase in digital transactions, but our branch transactions have remained steady. We continue to watch the numbers, but have not seen a major shift in the mix.

Our markets were strong before the pandemic, driven by high quality of life, business friendly environment, and low cost of living, and we are seeing signs that the natural social distancing that comes with our more rural markets will only add to the attractiveness of our footprint markets. Once again the third quarter results highlighted the consistent strength of our core business.

We reported earnings per share of $0.81, a 42% or 24% increase from the prior year third quarter. Net income was $77.8 million, which is an increase of $26.2 million or 51% from the prior year third