Huntington Bancshares reported strong Q4 results with 30c GAAP EPS (37c adjusted) and guided 2026 to 10-13% NII growth, 13-16% fee revenue growth, and 150-200bps operating leverage. Management highlighted the rapid Veritex integration (187 days) and strong Cadence performance pre-close, signaling confidence in synergy targets and capital return (including initiating $50M/quarter buybacks post-Cadence). The flywheel model of organic growth + partnerships is intact. Veritex conversion completed in 187 days; cost synergies fully running by Q2 2026.
Huntington Bancshares reported strong Q4 results with 30c GAAP EPS (37c adjusted) and guided 2026 to 10-13% NII growth, 13-16% fee revenue growth, and 150-200bps operating leverage. Management highlighted the rapid Veritex integration (187 days) and strong Cadence performance pre-close, signaling confidence in synergy targets and capital return (including initiating $50M/quarter buybacks post-Cadence). The flywheel model of organic growth + partnerships is intact. Veritex conversion completed in 187 days; cost synergies fully running by Q2 2026.
Huntington Bancshares reported strong Q4 results with 30c GAAP EPS (37c adjusted) and guided 2026 to 10-13% NII growth, 13-16% fee revenue growth, and 150-200bps operating leverage. Management highlighted the rapid Veritex integration (187 days) and strong Cadence performance…
Guidance tone
Guidance tone
Guidance tone
Management's guidance for 2026 calls for 10-13% NII growth, 13-16% fee revenue growth, and 150-200bps operating leverage, reflecting strong organic momentum and successful partnership integrations.
Management emphasized continued investment in digital technology, marketing, and people, expecting to grow investments at around 20% per year. This funds branch expansion in the Carolinas and Texas, digital acquisition, and other growth initiatives.
Management highlighted record or near-record performance, strong growth, and expressed confidence in future earnings power and integration execution.
“This concludes what has been an extremely efficient and well-executed conversion that's only taken 187 days since announcement.”
“We expect to have capacity to add approximately $50 million per quarter of repurchases to the mix of distribution in 2026 following the close of our partnership with Cadence.”
| Metric | Period | Range | Midpoint | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Op margin | FY2026 | 1.5%–2% | 1.75% | GUIDED |
| RevenueFEE_INCOME | FY2026 | 13%–16% | 14.5% | GUIDED |
Huntington completed the Veritex systems migration in just 187 days from announcement, a pace that enables earlier revenue synergy capture and sets a benchmark for the Cadence integration. — Faster integration reduces execution risk and accelerates the timeline for cross-sell and cost saves, potentially boosting near-term EPS.
“We substantially completed this process last weekend. This concludes what has been an extremely efficient and well-executed conversion that's only taken 187 days since announcement.”
… focus of value creation. We have undertaken a thoughtful approach to our combined organization's talent decisioning with a lot of input from the Cadence Management team and completed this work well in advance of closing. This creates certainty for our new colleagues and provides immediate line of sight to a large percentage of our call synergies. We've made significant progress on systems integration. For Veritex, we substantially completed this process last weekend. This concludes what has been an extremely efficient and well-executed conversion that's only taken 187 days since announcement. We can say with confidence that Veritex is now integrated into Huntington. For cadence, we're already advanced in our product and data mapping and expect systems migration to occur mid-year. This would also represent a highly expedited timeframe. Because of these actions, we are already realizing our targeted cost synergies from Veritex, which we expect to be fully included in our run rate by the second quarter. For cadence, we expect to begin realizing the identified cost benefits immediately upon closing and reach the full run rate in the fourth quarter of this year. As we deploy …
Huntington completed the Veritex systems migration in just 187 days from announcement, a pace that enables earlier revenue synergy capture and sets a benchmark for the Cadence integration. — Faster integration reduces execution risk and accelerates the timeline for cross-sell and cost saves, potentially boosting near-term EPS.
“We expect to begin realizing cost synergies almost immediately after closing with the full benefits run rating into expenses in the fourth quarter.”
… synergies later in the first quarter. We anticipate core expenses will grow 10% to 11%. and we expect to deliver a baseline of 150 to 200 basis points of operating leverage. This outlook includes the expected cost synergies we've targeted from Veritex, which we expect to be fully in the run rate of our cost base by the second quarter. We estimate Cadence will increase our expense base by approximately $1.1 billion. Similar to Veritex, we expect to begin realizing cost synergies almost immediately after closing with the full benefits run rating into expenses in the fourth quarter. We expect net charge-offs for the year to be between 25 and 35 basis points. Given our current starting point, we think losses will likely be at the lower end and normalize closer to the midpoint of that range over time. The combination with cadence doesn't change this view. The effective tax rate for the year is expected to be between 19 and 20%. The fully diluted average share count for the year, inclusive of cadence-related issuance, is expected to be approximately 2 billion and 20 million shares. For the first quarter, we expect the weighted average share count to be approximately 1.9 billion. …