Bill Rogers: Yeah. And I did note it because it’s a little bit different. So in the fourth quarter, we started seeing pipelines decrease a little bit. And here in the first quarter, we’ve seen pipelines improve, particularly on the commercial side. You know, how they get to execution and how they get to finalization will depend on a lot of market conditions. But the good news is clients are — they’re having the discussions, they’re having the debate about the new warehouse or the new fleet of trucks the things that they want to do to continue to expand their businesses. But most importantly, we’re just more relevant. I mean, we’re just more relevant in those discussions. I mean, the activity that we’ve been able to create in terms of new relationships, I mean, almost 60% of the activity that we added in the quarter were new relationships.
So new to Truist. So I think a lot of it’s at pitch activity is up, all the things we’re doing, new left leads are up. So I think it’s some combination of a little bit of the markets that we operate, probably a little more optimistic than the rest of the country. Our investments that we’ve made, products, capabilities, and our overall relevance with our clients. So we’re talking to them about things they want to listen to, they want to talk about, and I think we’re just better-positioned than we’ve ever been.
Betsy Graseck: And is that — okay, so then the follow-up is on the auto side, you mentioned that you’re leaning into indirect and high quality. So I just wanted to understand, you know, what does high-quality indirect autos mean to you? And then the relevance to corporate clients increasing, is that a function of balance sheet size or product mix or maybe you just — I know I squeezed in two, but it was a follow-up plus a follow-up? Thanks.
Bill Rogers: Betsy, you get extra permission.
Betsy Graseck: Okay. Thank you.
Bill Rogers: Yes, exactly. Yes, so on the auto side, maybe to compare and contrast, it’s not rack for us, it’s sort of our core prime auto business in terms of growth. And again, just being able to be a little more relevant to our dealers, and creating a little more capacity, you’ve seen lots of changes from people in and out of the auto side. We like the consistency of it. And again, we have a deep strong relationships with lots of dealers and this just adds to that portfolio. And then on the corporate side, same thing on the — if the question was related to the risk profile, similar kind of risk profile, I mean, we’re — we created, as I said, a lot of discipline over the last year in terms of we were optimizing capital and we want to continue to do that.
So the same expectations that we have for full relationships, the same expectations we have for our risk profile. So I think everything we’re adding is just more accretive than what we were adding before based on our capabilities.
Betsy Graseck: Okay. Thank you so much, Bill. I appreciate it.
Operator: Our next question comes from Scott Siefers from Piper Sandler. Please go ahead with your question.
Scott Siefers: Good morning, everyone. Thanks for taking the question. Let’s see, Mike, I wanted to just ask a little on the guide and the nuance. So if I understood it correctly, on an apples-to-apples basis, the full-year guide is the same for expenses, but tightened up to the low-end of a prior range as better fees are offset by slightly weaker NII outlook. So hopefully, I got that right. But within there, just curious for expanded thoughts on what has changed within the NII expectations. I imagine the preponderance of it is just fewer rate cut expectations with the 3% versus 6% previously, but maybe you could speak to other factors such as deposit mix or pricing nuance that might have impacted as well?
Bill Rogers: Yes. Scott, you made it easy for me. Those are the answers. So for us, we had five cuts back in January. I think the market had six. We’re looking now at 3%. I think the market has 2% or fewer, frankly. And so I think maybe one nuance to our outlook is that we believe that sort of 4% to 5% manages three cuts or even fewer cuts than 3%. So perhaps worth noting there. And then beyond just the curve , we have just — and I think our expectation in January, we were six months from the last hike and here we now sit at nine months, and we probably had an expectation that there’d be a touch less churn and pressure on pricing and mix on the liabilities portfolio side. So those are the two factors. And then, of course, we’re seeing some strength on the fee side. So put that in the blender and 4% to 5% feels right.
Mike Maguire: Yes. It’s Mike, as you know that does not include TIH repositioning. So we still have to say all this in the same setup [Multiple Speakers]
Scott Siefers: Yes, I totally understand. Thank you. And then, Mike, maybe just on sort of the competitive environment for funding. On the one hand, it’s a general question, but also curious to hear your thoughts in so far as there are a lot of out of market competitors encroaching on your pretty attractive demographic markets. Just curious to hear — just your thoughts on sort of rationality of funding pricing. Are they having a visible impact or is the market pretty rational as to what you would expect in a higher for longer environment? How are those things all projecting?
Mike Maguire: Yes. I mean, look, we — one of the benefits of operating in such attractive high-growth markets is they’re attractive to others as well. And so it’s always been a competitive marketplace for us. But I don’t think we’re seeing — I would — what I would describe as irrational behavior in the market. I think we’re at a little unusual moment in the cycle being as high as we are for as long as we’ve been here. And so you’re seeing a variety of strategies, but by and large, I think people are all trying to solve the same problem we are, which is when will we perhaps see some relief on the rate side. Meanwhile, we’re really just focused on supporting our clients, right? So we’ve got the right products we think, and the right client experiences. And we’re going to pay a competitive rate to defend the relationships that you would expect us to defend.
