So none of that has really changed. The last thing I’ll say, a third point, is that all of the modeling we’re doing continues to indicate that a higher rate scenario overall, all things equal, drives a higher NIM for us. Clearly the — how this plays out over such a short period of time, three quarters, will really depend on the shape and trajectory and timing and everything. But that’s the best we can do. And I think the guidance we’re trying to give here with this range of scenarios is designed to allow us to give you stability in terms of the revenue guidance, which ultimately is the most important thing.
Steven Alexopoulos: Got it. Zach, if we put all this together, you’re saying NII bottomed in the first quarter. But I didn’t hear you say NIM bottomed in the first quarter. Does that imply NIM has not bottomed in the first quarter?
Zach Wasserman : I expect to see NIM bouncing around these levels, or rising over the course of the rest of the year, depending on how the scenario plays out. And for that, kind of flat to rising NIM, coupled with accelerating loan growth, to drive accelerating net interest income on a dollar basis out of the first quarter into the second quarter of growth and then continuing to grow into the third and the fourth quarter.
Steven Alexopoulos: Got it. Okay. If I just — one separate question on the non-interest bearing deposits. Balance is down pretty sharp, average of period end, we’re seeing some of your peers showing in February and March good stability in those balances. Did you guys see that as well? Or did you see balances decline through the quarter? Thanks.
Zach Wasserman: Balances were modestly declining through the quarter. As we look at that — we see a few things. One is the trajectory of dollars of non-interest bearing actually decelerating in terms of their mix shift. Secondly, for the most part, all of the mix shift that we think will happen within consumer has happened. And where there is continued drift in Q1 is really in the business and commercial side. Another point would be we expect the non-interest-bearing mix shift, mix of the percentage to continue to stabilize in the high teens over the course of this year, which is 19.4% as of Q1. You know, and lastly I’ll say, as you think about that percentage, it’s very notable to measure that percentage if overall deposits are shrinking versus if they’re growing.
For us, overall deposits are growing strongly as we’ve said. So the mix is one thing, but the dollars are really the most important thing. In fact, we see stabilizing here over the course of the next couple of quarters.
Steven Alexopoulos: Got it. Thanks for taking my question.
Operator: Thank you. Next question is coming from Ebrahim Poonawala from Bank of America. Your line is now live.
Ebrahim Poonawala: Good morning.
Stephen Steinour : Good morning, Ebrahim.
Ebrahim Poonawala: I guess I just wanted to go back to something, Steve, you mentioned, I think in your prepared remarks, you said that the outlook in the economy is more conducive for growth. Your [indiscernible] probably the most upbeat, I’ve heard this over the last week. If you don’t mind spending some time in terms of breaking down what you’re seeing from customers in terms of strength and loan demand, looking into 2Q and beyond, and how much of this strength is just because of the proactive action Huntington has taken to hire bankers in Carolinas, Texas, would love some color around both those aspects. Thank you.
Stephen Steinour: Thank you, Ebrahim. The economy, we all see the aggregate metrics that are released. There’s an underlying strength. We’re seeing that, particularly because we’ve been proactive with our lending activities through last year, the core is performing well. We’re getting growth in our [auto book] [ph], our distribution finance in particular, our business bank, so very localized levels, principally here in the Midwest. We’re also getting growth in a number of our other areas. And these new verticals that have been added, they’ve all closed the loans. They’ve all generated lending activity and other activity. And the Carolina expansion and Texas expansion are delivering results and look very promising to us. So we’ve positioned the bank both with the core activities and these incremental investments, I think, to outperform peers in loan growth and perhaps in a number of other respects as well, certainly through this year and potentially beyond.
The pipeline activity I referenced earlier is very promising. And again, the strength of the first quarter with every month improving gives us a lot of confidence. Our investment banking activity, Capstone related, their pipeline is bigger than they’ve ever had, as an example. So we’ve got a lot of opportunity in front of us, so now we have to deliver it.
Ebrahim Poonawala: That was helpful. And Zach, a couple of follow-ups for you. One, apologies on NII. I feel like I’m more confused after some of this back and forth. Should we expect if we don’t get any rate cuts or maybe just one cut, NII tends towards up 2%. Is that the right takeaway?
Zach Wasserman : It will really be a [technical difficulty] take there. So I think the outcome will be somewhere between that range of EV. When we give these ranges, we try to generally box our plan and land in the middle of it. But of course, there’s a bit of variance and just normal variability that’s hard to forecast with such decision. So that’s the expectation. I think we’ll see, as I noted, just to clarify, a flat to rising NIM, a slightly higher NIM in the higher rate scenario, albeit with different drivers, and really coupling that with accelerating loan growth will drive dollars out of the level we’ve seen in Q1, up into Q2 and beyond, and to land for a full year somewhere in the middle of that range.
Ebrahim Poonawala: All right, so multiple scenarios, middle of the range. And any scenario where this could exceed that up 2%?
Zach Wasserman : Certainly it’s possible. We’ll have to see how the rate environment plays out here. I think really at this point, we’re probably parsing the precision more than is reasonable. It’s still a pretty moving target in terms of where the yield curve is now, but I think we’ll land somewhere in that range is our best estimate.
