Simmons First National Corp. earned $27 million in the fourth quarter of 2016, a year-over-year increase of 13.4 percent, pushing its net income for the year to $96.8 million, an increase of more than 30 percent.
The Pine Bluff bank holding company's announcement, after the market close on Wednesday, said quarterly results included $1.8 million in expenses related to mergers and the closing of branches of its subsidiary Simmons Bank. Earnings per share were 85 cents, a 9 percent increase for the quarter, while diluted annual EPS were $3.13.
"We are very pleased with our results during the fourth quarter. Our associates are beginning to leverage our size and integrate more of our services in markets previously unserved," Chairman and CEO George A. Makris Jr. said in the earnings release. "We are excited about our future related to our previously announced mergers. Simmons Bank will enter new and very attractive markets as a result of the Bank SNB merger and will be able to expand in our current markets with the First South Bank merger. We look forward to significant growth from these mergers."
Also: Simmons and Home BancShares are set to join the $10 billion-asset club.
Simmons expects to close its acquisition of Bank SNB's parent, Southwest Bancorp Inc. of Stillwater, Oklahoma, in the third quarter of this year. The acquisition of Hardeman County Investment Co. of Jackson, Tennessee, parent of First South Bank, is expected before the end of March. Those acquisitions are expected to push the bank's assets to about $11 billion from the 2016 year-end level of $8.4 billion.
Net interest income for the fourth quarter was $74.3 million, up less than 1 percent from the same period of 2015. Non-interest income, meanwhile, was $36.1 million, an increase of 26 percent "due to additional mortgage lending, trust income, debit and credit card income," according to the release.
Total loans, including those acquired, were $5.6 billion at year-end, an increase 14.5 percent, while legacy loans — those not acquired — grew $1.1 billion, or 33.3 percent. On a linked quarter basis, total loan growth was $232 million, including a reduction in agricultural production loans of $53 million.
Deposits as of Dec. 31 were $6.7 billion, an increase of 10.7 percent over the end of 2015. Total assets were $8.4 billion.