"Street Talk" is a podcast hosted by S&P Global Market Intelligence that takes a deep dive into issues facing financial institutions and the investment community.
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Tales from Top Performers is a new series under the "Street Talk" banner that will feature conversations with executives at high-performing banks about their bank and experience in the sector, their view of current issues, and the greatest challenges and opportunities they see ahead.
The inaugural episode features a discussion with James Beckwith, CEO of Rancho Cordova, Calif.-based Five Star Bancorp, a previous winner of S&P Global Market Intelligence's annual bank rankings; and James Pittenger, vice president and head of Financial Institutions Corporates at S&P Global Market Intelligence. Five Star remained one of the top performers in 2023.
In the episode, Beckwith discusses how he got into banking, what he loves about the industry, how his institution has built an attractive deposit franchise and managed elevated exposure to commercial real estate, and his view on the greatest challenges and opportunities ahead.
GREATEST OPPORTUNITY OVER THE NEXT 12 MONTHS:
Building new relationships, growing market share amid M&A fallout
"The largest opportunity for us is just to really garner new relationships in our markets, the primary markets in which we operate is a bit of a free for all right now given all the M&A activity, given all the closures that have happened or failed banks that have happened. And so, we think that that's created a lot of runway for us in terms of new customer acquisition. And so, we're taking advantage of that," Beckwith said.
The inverted yield curve and a potential recession
"The inverted yield curve has really hurt our margins, just like everybody else in the banking business. So that's probably the biggest concern," Beckwith said. "And then, of course, the resulting impact of the recession that could have on credit quality, which ours is very good, but nevertheless, it's going to affect the rest of the industry."
