Investar Holding Corporation Announces 2024 Second Quarter Results
ACCESS Newswire · Investar Holding Corporation

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BATON ROUGE, LA / ACCESSWIRE / July 22, 2024 / Investar Holding Corporation ("Investar") (NASDAQ:ISTR), the holding company for Investar Bank, National Association (the "Bank"), today announced financial results for the quarter ended June 30, 2024. Investar reported net income of $4.1 million, or $0.41 per diluted common share, for the second quarter of 2024, compared to net income of $4.7 million, or $0.48 per diluted common share, for the quarter ended March 31, 2024, and net income of $6.5 million, or $0.67 per diluted common share, for the quarter ended June 30, 2023.

On a non-GAAP basis, core earnings per diluted common share for the second quarter of 2024 were $0.36 compared to $0.43 for the first quarter of 2024, and $0.67 for the second quarter of 2023. Core earnings exclude certain items including, but not limited to, loss on call or sale of investment securities, net, (gain) loss on sale or disposition of fixed assets, net, gain on sale of other real estate owned, net, change in the fair value of equity securities, write down of other real estate owned, and gain on early extinguishment of subordinated debt (refer to the Reconciliation of Non-GAAP Financial Measures tables for a reconciliation of GAAP to non-GAAP metrics).

Investar's President and Chief Executive Officer John D'Angelo commented:

"I am excited about our second quarter results as we continued to execute our strategy of consistent, quality earnings through the optimization of our balance sheet. Despite the higher for longer rate environment, our net interest margin expanded for the second consecutive quarter to 2.62% as we remained focused on originating higher yielding loans and securing lower cost funding sources that are accretive to our margin. During the second quarter we originated and renewed loans, 80% of which were variable-rate loans, at an 8.6% blended interest rate.

We remain inwardly focused on controlling the things that we can control. We are originating high quality loans and allowing higher risk credit relationships to run off. As a result, credit quality remained very solid as nonperforming loans represented only 0.23% of total loans. Additionally, we repurchased $7.0 million in principal amount of subordinated debt at a significant discount to par and recognized a gain of $0.3 million while maintaining a strong capital position.

Finally, I could not be more excited about the future of Investar. Our team has exhibited remarkable resilience as we have proactively managed through a difficult and uncertain economic environment. Our liability sensitive balance sheet and efforts to optimize our asset mix strategically position us to benefit from a more favorable interest rate environment. Additionally, we have begun to reinvest in geographic areas, particularly our Texas markets, with long-term growth potential, as part of our strategy to remix and strengthen our balance sheet and improve GAAP and core metrics in the coming years.