Columbia Banking System Inc
NASDAQ:COLB
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Columbia Banking System Inc
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Good day, everyone. Welcome to the Umpqua Holdings Corporation Second Quarter 2019 Earnings Call. Today's conference is being recorded. At this time, I would like to turn the call over to Mr. Ron Farnsworth, Chief Financial Officer. Please go ahead, sir.
Okay. Thank you, Allen. Good morning, and thank you for joining us today on our second quarter 2019 earnings call. With me this morning are Cort O'Haver, the President and CEO of Umpqua Holdings Corporation; Tory Nixon, our Chief Banking Officer; Dave Shotwell, our Chief Risk Officer; and Frank Namdar, our Chief Credit Officer.
After our prepared remarks, we will then take questions. Yesterday afternoon, we issued an earnings release discussing our second quarter 2019 results. We have also prepared a slide presentation, which we will refer to during our remarks this morning. Both of these materials can be found on our website at umpquabank.com in the Investor Relations section.
During today's call, we will make forward-looking statements, which are subject to risks and uncertainties and are intended to be covered by the safe harbor provisions of federal securities law. For a list of factors that may cause actual results to differ materially from expectations, please refer to Page 2 of our earnings conference call presentation as well as the disclosures contained within our SEC filings.
And I will now turn the call over to Cort O'Haver.
Okay. Thank you, Ron. Let me begin by providing a brief recap of our quarterly financial performance and then I'll provide an update on Umpqua Next Gen. Ron will discuss the financials in more detail and then we'll take your questions.
Our Q2 2019 financial performance resulted in earnings per share of $0.51. This is up from the $0.34 we earned in the prior quarter and the $0.30 reported in the second quarter of 2018. The increase in earnings per share from the prior quarter reflects several strategic moves to enhance the company's long-term profitability. This includes the gain on sale of $81.9 million recorded from the Visa Class B transaction we executed during the quarter. We were opportunistic in the timing of the sale and used the proceeds to strategically rebalance our securities portfolio and continue to invest in efficient revenue-generating businesses. Also included in this quarter's financial result was a $24.7 million negative adjustment, reflect -- related to the fair value change of the MSR asset. This adjustment was primarily driven by the reduction of long-term interest rates that occurred during the quarter.
As previewed before, we are implementing tactics to reduce the quarter-to-quarter volatility, resulting from the MSR fair value changes. We are currently executing a sale of up to 25% of our mortgage servicing rights. We also improved our financial disclosures regarding the components of the fair value changes, which Ron will cover in his remarks. As I stated last quarter, mortgage-related products and services are and will continue to be a core business for us at Umpqua.
Now I'll highlight our strong balance sheet growth for the second quarter. Deposit growth for the quarter of $575 million represents a strong annualized growth rate of 10.8%. Our initiatives that are focused on growing deposits will continue to be a priority as we go forward. We also generated loan and lease growth of $547 million, which represents a robust annual growth rate of 10.7%. Our emphasis on diversified loan growth is showing positive results, highlighted by growth of $208 million in our C&I vertical during the quarter.
Now a quick update on Umpqua Next Gen. We are at the halfway point in our Umpqua Next Gen strategy, and I'm pleased with our performance so far and optimistic about what lies ahead, specifically with the strong performances we are seeing out of our core businesses. I'll start with balanced growth. With our commercial, corporate, global payments and deposits groups, we've added over 20 experienced customer-facing associates this year as we continue to build out teams that are focused on bringing multifaceted relationships to the bank. We will continue to add new associates and new teams to Umpqua in the coming quarters as we continue working to meet our growth initiatives.
We've also made terrific progress with our human-digital strategic priority. We launched Umpqua Go-To, the industry's first human-digital banking platform this past quarter. We currently have more than 27,000 customers enrolled on the app and more are joining every day. In addition, this quarter, we are implementing a predictive analytic tool for use within our commercial and corporate teams. The tool uses algorithms to inform our bankers about the future products and services our customers are likely to need based on their current activity and is a very powerful tool to help our teams continue building robust relationships.
I'll finish by updating the progress made within the operational excellence initiative. We have successfully completed the store consolidation work on 5 locations we highlighted on the prior earnings call for a total of 20 year-to-date. We have also identified an additional 8 locations for consolidation by the end of this year. This will bring our total store rationalization number to 65 since Q3 of 2017.
I am also pleased to report that Phase 1 of our back-office work is complete. Since launching the initiative, we have achieved $24 million in annualized savings. I want to highlight that due to this work and the store optimizations previously mentioned, our year-to-date noninterest expense in 2019 is 8% lower than it was in the same period a year before. Phase 2 of the back office work continues as we continue to create opportunities to operate the company in an efficient and effective manner. Now back to Ron to cover the financial results.
Okay. Thank you, Cort. And for those on the call, who want to follow along, I'll be referring to certain page numbers from our earnings presentation.
Turning first to Page 6 of the slide presentation, which contains our quarterly P&L. GAAP earnings per share were $0.51 this quarter, up from $0.34 from the first quarter. Notable items impacting earnings this quarter were the combined security gain lines benefit to EPS of $0.26, more than offsetting the continued negative fair value effects of declining long-term interest rates with fair value losses of $0.08 for the mortgage servicing right asset and $0.01 for the swap derivative. Additionally, prepayment speeds on the bond portfolio have increased resulting in a $9 million increase in taxable bond premium amortization this quarter, which is about $6 million higher than we expected, negatively affecting earnings per share by $0.02. Ex these items, adjusted earnings were $0.37 per share.
Turning to net interest income on Slide 7. Interest income decreased $10 million or 4% from Q1. Interest income was steady with the growth for interest on loans and leases offset by lower investment interest. Within the loan interest increase, the majority was related to healthy growth leading to higher average balances during the quarter. Discount accretion on acquired loans remained flat at $5 million this quarter and is expected to decline modestly over the coming quarters. For the taxable investment income line item, premium amortization was $10.4 million, up from $1.6 million in the first quarter, due to increasing prepayment speeds on the underlying MBS investments. This is a retrospective adjustment and was about $6 million higher than we would expect moving forward assuming no further change in prepayment speeds. Our interest expense increased $9.5 million or 19 basis points based on continued average balance growth and rising short-term rates over the past -- over the last several quarters. Our cumulative deposit beta based on the Fed rate increases to date was 40%.
As reflected on Slide 8, our net interest margin was 3.7% this past quarter and the margin excluding discount accretion was 3.61%, down a bit more than expected from the first quarter. The majority of the decrease resulted from increased bond premium amortization just discussed along with the increase in cost of deposits. Normalized in the bond yield at roughly 2.5% with $4.5 million of premium amortization would add 10 basis points back to the margin.
On Slide 9, the quarterly provision for loan and lease losses increased to $19 million, which is primarily a result of strong growth we had on the balance sheet this quarter as net charge-offs were relatively consistent.
And moving now to noninterest income on Slide 10. We generated a total noninterest income of $122 million for the quarter, and this included net security gains of $75 million, more than offsetting lower mortgage revenue. As a result of lower long-term interest rates this quarter, we took a $25 million fair value loss on the MSR asset and mortgage banking revenue, along with a $4 million customer swap derivative fair value loss in other income.
For mortgage banking, as shown on Slide 11, for-sale mortgage originations increased 43% from the first quarter. As expected, our gain on sale margin increased 37 basis points to 3.32%, based on higher pricing and an increase in the [ lock ] pipeline with the higher volume. The MSR asset reflecting lower long-term mortgage rates and associated increase in prepayment expectations is now valued at 88 basis points on the $15.8 billion in service loans. We have provided additional detail of the total quarterly change in balance here and on the last 2 pages of the earnings release.
Noting new volume offset by the change due to collection of expected cash flows over time, along with changes in valuation due primarily to interest rate fluctuations. This last row is the one which correlates most closely with the change in long-term interest rates. And the $17.8 million change for inputs this quarter reflects the approximate 50 basis point drop in long-term bond yields during Q2. We've been impacted by the reduction of long-term interest rates over the past year with the higher origination volume one would expect to see with lower rates not coming close to making up for these fair value hits. We are currently in the process of selling up to 1/4 of the MSR portfolio and expect to complete that in the fourth quarter.
With this and another potential sale of a similar amount late this year or early next, we are repositioning the asset and allocated capital to focus on more full relationships carrying deposit balances, which will improve the overall profitability of the business and reduce potential future volatility to the P&L from these rate-related changes.
Turning now to Slide 12. Noninterest expense was $180.4 million, a decrease of 8% from the second quarter a year ago and up 5% from the prior quarter. This was slightly above our guidance range of $174 million to $179 million, related primarily to $5 million of higher mortgage banking production costs and a loss on OREO, partially offset by favorable variances elsewhere. The bridge on the right side of Slide 12 shows the moving parts from the first quarter, and in addition to the 2 items just discussed, the other expected cost increases seasonally in Q2 were offset by expected reductions in payroll taxes and lower group insurance costs. Note the efficiency ratio is 51.6% on the face of the P&L for Q2, but our internal measure was 59% when adjusting out the security gains and MSR and CVA fair value charges discussed earlier, higher than expected but reflective of the lower-investment interest income. Regarding the operational excellence program, as Cort mentioned, we've now reached a healthy $24 million in annualized savings and have finished Phase 1 and are continuing to work for Phase 2.
Turning now to the balance sheet. Beginning on Slide 13. We increased our interest-bearing cash this quarter to just under $700 million, and Cort mentioned earlier the higher loan and deposit growth. We mentioned the gain on Visa stock sale earlier. We also repositioned a portion of the investment portfolio by selling roughly $300 million of higher-premium mortgage-backed securities and reinvesting into longer-term bullet agency securities. This trade was done to reduce our asset sensitivity to future rates down scenarios and reduce future bond premium amortization volatility. And resulted in the $7 million-plus loss on sale of debt securities reflected on the income statement. A portion of the proceeds were also used to reduce term borrowings with the Federal Home Loan Bank. Our total available liquidity remains strong at $10.5 billion, including off-balance sheet sources. The mix of loans and deposits as shown on Slide 14, our strong loan balance growth this quarter was centered in C&I and residential real estate. The decline in consumer loans continues as a result of our targeted wind-down of the indirect dealer auto portfolio. And within deposits, we had strong growth in noninterest bearing demand supported by roughly 3,000 new customer accounts, along with money market deposits. Broker deposits were down $190 million, offset by a like-amount increase in public deposits.
Slide 15 reflects the repricing characteristics of our loan and lease portfolio, knowing that our floating and adjustable rate loan mix remained consistent over the past few quarters.
And on Slide 16, we have highlighted the geographic diversification of our loan portfolio across the footprint. We also provide some selected loan and underwriting characteristics for each major area. As mentioned on previous calls, we are happy with the granular nature of the loan book.
Slide 17 reflects our credit quality stats and highlights the strength of our portfolio as shown by the low level of classified loans on the upper right chart, just 7.6% of capital. In the bottom right chart, we break out our FinPac Leasing Group net charge-offs from that of the rest of the bank, knowing the leasing component has been fairly consistent around 3% to 3.5% for the past year. Keep in mind that the weighted average yield of this portfolio is a very healthy 10%.
And lastly on Slide 18, I want to highlight capital, knowing that all of our regulatory ratios remain in excess of well-capitalized levels with our Tier 1 common at 10.9% and total risk-based capital of 13.7%. With our quarterly common stock dividend of $0.21 per share, the total payout ratio was 42% this quarter.
Also, our tangible book value per share is $10.97, which when you also account for the $0.21 of dividends to shareholders last quarter, increased 7% over the first quarter. Our excess capital is approximately $210 million and will provide us with several opportunities no matter the economic or rate scenario over the intermediate-term horizon.
And to conclude, our focus is on executing all aspects of our Umpqua Next Gen strategy, improving financial results and generating solid returns to shareholders over time, including the healthy dividend. And with that, we will now take your questions.
[Operator Instructions] We'll take our first caller. Michael Young with SunTrust.
Michael?
Okay, we'll move to our next caller. That will be Steven Alexopoulos with JPMorgan.
Can you guys hear me?
We can, Steve.
Yes.
Okay. All right. I wanted to start, Ron, with the margin. There's quite a few moving pieces to the quarter. Assuming the Fed cuts by 25 basis points in July, where do you think the NIM heads to in 3Q?
Good question. Well, assuming that Fed doesn't cut, I expect our margin will be up 10 bps, assuming relatively flat rates, prepays stay relatively unchanged and our bond yield would be up closer to 2.5%. We are slightly asset sensitive that, of course, includes -- on the downside. We are making moves to reduce that asset sensitivity on the downside. So might be a little bit of pressure, but it would be within the range of plus or minus 5 bps as we have been talking about for the last couple of quarters. We do have quite a bit of higher cost of borrowings and deposits that, as we continue to generate lower-cost deposits, we're able to refund the lender there to help buffer the impact on the downside.
Got you. So roughly speaking, for every 25 basis points on the Fed, it would be 5 basis points or so impact to margin, right?
A lot of other moving parts in there?
Yes.
There is a lot of moving parts in there.
But that's what you're saying? Okay. And on the sale of mortgage servicing asset, can you give us a sense if you do get that 25% done in the fourth quarter, what's the revenue give up? And I'm trying to get to the net impact. Are there any material cost saves?
Right. There will be cost saves, but the majority of the change you'll see there is a reduction in the volatility. So again, on the last 2 pages of the earnings release, we break out not only the mortgage revenue in detail but also the change in the MSR. So if you take roughly 1/4 of the servicing revenue growth, that's going to be right around $2.5 million to $3 million. If you take 1/4 of the passage of time charge on the MSR, that's going to be close to $2 million. You can see pretty quickly it's pretty small impact on pretax and that's before we talk about changes in rates affecting volatility and the fair value changes.
Okay. Got you. And then just finally you guys continue to put up good loan growth numbers. Can you talk about what's competition now for C&I? Talk about price and structure. And are you walking away from any deals? I know net you are showing good growth. I'd love to hear more on the competitive environment.
Steven, this is Tory Nixon. The competitive nature I mean really hasn't changed over the last 7 or 8 quarters. We're -- a lot of our growth has been in this lower mid-market business that is a part of our corporate banking strategy that we launched a couple of years ago. We continue to add bankers. We continue to fight to win business, but we definitely are walking away from business that doesn't make sense from the bank's overall profitability numbers. So competition is fierce in the west, but -- and we're winning our fair share, but we're definitely being choosy on what we bring into the company and how we price it both on the deposit side and on the loan side.
[Operator Instructions] We'll next go to Jeff Rulis with D.A. Davidson.
A follow-up on the -- well, I guess on the expense side, you talked about Phase 1 being complete and I think the last quarter you talked about Phase 2 savings. At that run rate of $6 million to $8 million by the end of the year, I guess how much is captured of the Phase 2 expected savings in the second quarter? And what could be coming in the back half of the year?
Jeff, this is Ron. Yes, very little in Q2. We would expect to see that start to pick up by Q4. We'll talk more about that on the Q3 and Q4 calls. That component, too, though, is pretty small on a quarterly run rate basis, but we are making good progress on it.
The 1 -- I guess, the implied $1.5 million to $2 million kind of run rate of that figure that's still expected to feather in by the end of kind of Q4?
Correct.
Okay. And Ron, you've laid out some expense -- noninterest expense ranges in the past, didn't hear one. I don't know if we can look at the kind of the OREO and marketing costs. Are you comfortable with the range for the quarter putting that out there?
Yes, definitely. I didn't want to give a specific range, but I would definitely back out the OREO as you look into Q3, then the only other real moving part over the balance of the year is going to be on the home lending production side. Generally, it's a bell curve through the year, Q2, Q3 higher amounts, Q1, Q4 lower amounts. So I expect we will be pretty static in Q3 absent the OREO.
Just on the loan side, your consumer runoff was about half the level of the previous quarter and it'd been running down auto. Has the planned, I guess, consumer runoff, is that largely complete? Or is there some to go kind of just looking for the outlook on the consumer segment going forward?
Yes. The majority of that consumer segment is that indirect dealer auto portfolio and that will continue to run down. There will probably be another 1.5 years to 2 years of consistent amounts on a quarterly basis.
But a diminishing run-off?
Right.
We will next go to Matthew Clark with Piper Jaffray.
Wanted to hone in on deposit costs. It looked like the rate of increase stepped-up here this quarter. Assuming the Fed cuts at the end of the month, I guess how should we think about the progression of deposit costs? I mean do you still like they can peak here in the third quarter and start to trend lower with the Fed cut? Or do you feel like there's going to be some lag effect for a couple more quarters?
That's my expectation that they would peak in Q3 and then start to run down and again consistent with what we're seeing on core lower cost deposit growth.
Okay. Great. And then on the -- as we look into 2020, the branch closures being, call it, 65 out of the targeted 99, 100, is there still a plan to close those additional 35-or-so branches in the upcoming year or any change there?
Matt, Cort. So a -- yes, a couple of things I'd say. It has -- our performance in our stores has changed fairly dramatically since we rolled this out in late '17 or specifically our average store deposits were up 12% in that period of time. Our new customer generation per store is up 50% in the last 5 or 6 quarters. So we're seeing better performance out of our stores and the reason to tell you that is we look at our stores all the time and kind of balance them again production metrics, opportunities to grow market share, et cetera, et cetera. To get to the answer to your question.
And then with the increase in our -- in the borrowing cost with the lift that we've seen there is a different math, if you will, looking at the incremental cost if we had a wholesale borrow to replace the additional consolidations into 2020. So I guess I'm going to tell you, we look at rationalizing our stores on a continual basis but we're balancing it against better performance and then the cost that -- kind of looking at -- at the cost that if we have a wholesale borrow compared to organically grow. So we're going to rationalize and I know we told you guys that we reduced our store exposure and if we see that it makes financial sense, we will continue to rationalize those stores into 2020.
Okay. And then just picking up the 2020 goals that you -- I think you originally laid out a while back for Next Gen. I think you had 2 scenarios in there. One was for flat rates, one was for up rates. We've obviously gotten the opposite scenario here. How do you feel about those financial goals? I assume it's really the downside just being the NIM, but just updated thoughts there on the overall financial goals?
Matt, this is Ron. Yes. So right now, we're probably in between the 2. Just with the performance and what we're seeing for the Fed increases to date. We'll provide more updates later in the year or January looking into 2020 specifically, just there's too many potential ranges of outcomes on rates for 2020 at this point. But the updated guidance, still feel good about, obviously, Next Gen initiatives and our organic growth strategies and more importantly, the capital allocation. But the one big moving part of that would be the margin being asset sensitive. But we'll provide updates on that as we get closer to the end of the year.
Okay. And then just one last one, if I could, on the reserve ratio. You guys had strong growth here and you provided for it. Should we assume that, that coverage ratio continues to bump up here ahead of CECL or maybe not?
We're really not seeing anything on the early cycle delinquency side, just very incredibly good credit quality. I'd expect it to be around these levels for the balance of the year and we get into CECL. We will -- we are planning on a SAB 74 disclosure in our third quarter Q with a better estimate of CECL for 1/1/20 adoption, but I expect to see it around these levels for the balance of the year.
And next, we'll go to David Long with Raymond James.
I have a question regarding CECL. Just curious if you guys have discussed how the CECL may change your appetite to make certain types of loans?
We are discussing that, obviously. CECL has more of an implication for longer-term, fixed-rate assets. I think there's an awful lot of discussion going on in the industry on that. If anybody gives you a sense of what specifically it will be today, it's probably a bit early on that front. So let's talk more about that as we get to year-end and adopt CECL 1/1/20. Could be some changes but nothing with clarity at this point.
Got it. Okay. And then as far as loan growth goes, it's been pretty good here. It sounds like you've got a pretty good pipeline. Most people would agree that we are late in the cycle. What gives you comfort in continuing to grow the loan portfolio this late in the cycle?
Dave, this is Tory Nixon. I think there's a couple of things. We continue to adhere to the bank's quality and underwriting the standards we have set. So as we progress forward and kind of expand in the different lines of business, we're doing it under a lens of extremely strong credit quality. And we're seeing the -- our markets in the west are still -- are doing well, there is no signs of significant issue really in kind of any asset class. And when you kind of match those up together, we're finding opportunity to continue to expand the business on the lending side, including -- and that lending is really about full banking relationships. So we're doing it with loans, deposits and core fee income. So that's the plan and we've kind of been sticking to that for long time.
Got it. Okay. Last question for me regarding the loss on the fair value of the debt capital market swap. Geographically, around where would I find that on the income statement? Is that in the other fees?
That's buried in other noninterest income, and it purely moves up and down the opposite of long-term bond yields. Yes, Dave, we've also historically disclosed that on the bottom of the first page of the release in the notable items section.
Our next question comes from Jared Shaw with Wells Fargo Securities.
Just looking at the MSR and the 25% sale and the potential for another 25%, I guess how did you come with that level? And why not just sort of get out of the whole mortgage servicing business I guess at that point?
Mortgage is very much a core component of our product offering, has been for several years and will be for several years going forward. So as we look to size that, we look through the composition of the portfolio and how it's been built up over the years and really in line with everything you heard Tory and Cort talk about over the past 2 years with the Next Gen strategy, we've had a very balanced approach, we have deep customer relationships. So that portfolio, roughly half of it has full deposit relationships, the other half is more [ transactional ] in nature. And I saw that as a good line in the sand to reduce volatility in addition to the enhanced disclosures that we concluded this quarter and reallocate that excess capital into the higher sustainable fee revenue initiatives that Tory has been talking about.
Okay. So that 50% that you look to retain those more full-service relationship customers?
Correct.
Okay. And then I guess looking at the gain on sale margin this quarter, is this level sustainable here? Or was there something that caused that to be elevated in the second quarter? And should we expect to see that maybe dip back down?
There's probably 5, 10 bps in there of lock pipeline increase and I expect that will be relatively consistent into the third quarter. And then a lot of wildcards there, but let's assume rates stay flat. You would expect to see a seasonal drop-off in the volume in the fourth quarter. So I expect that margin probably tail down closer to 3 back in Q4, just with that drop in lock pipeline. But the performance over the past year has been in line with what we've been expecting and talking about for the last couple of quarters. So we're happy to see that.
Next question comes from the line of Luke Wooten with KBW.
Just a couple of quick questions as most of mine have been asked. Just on the new 20 -- the 20 new customer-facing associates. Just wanted to see if the expense run rate for those new associates was baked into the 2Q salary line? Or if we should expect that to increase later in the year?
It's baked into 2Q.
Okay. All right. Perfect. And then just on origination volumes. I know you touched briefly on it in the last question, but just how do you see that going forward with lower rates and kind of into 2020? Just broad level.
So Luke, it's Tory Nixon. So you are referring to home lending or just originations across all loan products?
Apologies. I'm referring to home lending.
Okay. Yes. Home lending is kind of a -- as we're talking about kind of full bank -- full relationship banking and when the migration really is around portfolio growth in the home lending business to be customers of the bank. So we'll continue to be competitive and continue to use the product itself with our customers. So kind of depending on continuing rate movements and where we see that, that product is going to serve our customers and the bank well.
[Operator Instructions] We'll go back to Michael Young with SunTrust.
Sorry about earlier. Cort, wanted to start off maybe just on the Go-To Banker initiative. I know it's pretty early in terms of the rollout broadly at this point, but is there a point at which you think you'll have some updated implications of what that means for the bank after kind of a test phase? And do you think, that that can have some offset versus maybe less branch rationalization going into 2020?
It's a great question. So yes, we will. I think we've told you all that once we get further into the -- it's not a rollout anymore as we continue to kind of penetrate and pick up customers and develop ways to hold ourselves accountable. We'll avail that information to you. It's kind of still too new to be quite honest with you. We've only been doing it for about 4 months. So I'll make a commitment to get you guys some information and visibility on what we're doing with it.
But you hit on a very good point and it goes back to the question I got earlier about store rationalization. We're seeing good lift in Go-To. We're seeing customers use it. I know we all use it here in the room and it does allow us a different way to look at our store rationalization combined with the better performance. Just to give you an example, if you were going to combine some stores into a community or even potentially leave a community, but you can leave the Go-To Banker behind and do other things, with other -- offer products with other FIs. It does completely change your -- rationalization of your stores. It's a great question. And as we get further into the rollout, development of what we do [ with ] Go-To and provide products and services through analytics to our bankers and all the things we do, we'll give you that information.
Okay. And maybe just another big picture one for you, Cort, just on the Next Gen initiative overall. Just kind of a macro backdrop against where you initially started this program and kind of where we are now, especially from a rate perspective has shifted. So is there any update in terms of how far or how fast we can achieve some of those goals?
Well, I mean going to the first phase goals, just financial goals, I -- we delivered on those quite frankly quicker than I thought we would. And I was pleased about that. One of the reasons we actually kind of held tight in Q2 on stores -- because we had delivered on those savings and had delivered on that efficiency ratio until rates moved against us. So I'm very pleased with the progress we made on the first phase. I'm pleased -- in all aspects: the balanced growth, which you've heard Tory talk about; the expense savings and then the human-digital what we're doing to use Go-To as a very unique offering.
The Phase 2, which we are getting into right now, I think we will be successful on. Like we've told you before, we always deliver on these numbers when we give them to you. We are looking at things as we go out beyond the Next Gen. The 3-year Next Gen, we're halfway through it, right? We're getting into the second half pretty substantially and as we get into the end of year 3, we will come up with another set of kind of initiatives around where we want to take the company. So I'm very, very pleased with what we've done. We're going to be successful with the next phase, and things have changed over the last 3 quarters. As you guys have all asked, it does maybe change some of the things that we do, maybe it hastes -- quickens those, maybe we have to change what we're doing. But we will continue to execute on the second phase of Next Gen and we're really pleased.
And Ron, maybe just one quick follow-up on the mortgage line item. I think you guys called out a little over $4 million and kind of seasonally higher expenses there, gain on sale is kind of improved. So is there less likely a chance that you guys are going to kind of pull back either some of the fixed or variable costs in that business now?
That question is more about drastic changes in volume looking forward, which would be driven a lot by rate. I think really near term, I'd expect to see similar levels in the third quarter and then tapering off seasonally in the fourth.
All right. It looks like we have no further questions at this time. So I'd like to turn it back to our speakers for any additional or closing remarks.
Okay. Thanks. Thank you for your interest in Umpqua Holdings and your attendance today. This will conclude the call. Goodbye.
And once again, that does conclude today's conference. We thank everyone for their participation.