Amerant Lands the Plane — Now It Has to Prove It Can Fly

The plane has landed

For three quarters Carlos Iafigliola had been telling investors Amerant was circling two numbers without touching down:

I believe there has been several earnings calls that we have been flying around the airport of these 2 numbers, but very difficult to land the plane.

This quarter it landed. Net income of $25.7 million, $0.65 diluted, and — in the CEO's own words — “our return on assets reached 1%” — Carlos Iafigliola, President and CEO · 2026-10-23. Return on equity hit 12.9%, the efficiency ratio fell to 63.51% from 68.37%, and pre-tax pre-provision revenue of $39.7 million was the best since the fourth quarter of 2022.

Then came the sentence that matters most: “I believe the 1% ROA is a new baseline.” — Carlos Iafigliola, President and CEO · 2026-10-23 A year ago that same number was called an aspiration, a stretch, a plane that wouldn't land. Reclassifying it as a floor is a genuine change in register — the new baseline framing is the story of this quarter. The only question worth asking is whether it is a floor or a ceiling.

Anatomy of a 25-basis-point quarter

Net interest income rose $7.9 million to $90.5 million, lifting the net interest margin to 3.77% from 3.52%. Follow the bridge and the composition is revealing: loans contributed 18 basis points from variable-rate repricing and the opportunistic deployment of liquidity, securities added 3, cost of funds added 2 — and then this:

Six of the 25 basis points came from collecting on loans that had been written down. Chief Financial Officer Sharymar Calderon was commendably honest about it, describing the fourth-quarter guide of 3.65%-3.70% as “an improvement versus the normalized Q3 NIM.” — Sharymar Calderon Yepez, Chief Financial Officer · 2026-10-23 Normalize out the NPL collections and the quarter was roughly a 3.71% margin printing 3.77%. The 1% ROA, in other words, was partly manufactured by resolution work. That is not a criticism — resolution work is the business model right now — but it means the baseline needs a repeatable engine underneath it.

The macro tailwind is real but not proprietary. A Fed rate hike was the second-highest-momentum theme across the entire market this quarter, and Amerant's own forecast leans on it: “if rate hikes happen, we would get closer to the $3.70. And if rates are stable, that would take us closer to the $3.65.” — Sharymar Calderon Yepez, Chief Financial Officer · 2026-10-23 This company is riding a wave, not building one — the rate hike sensitivity is shared with a dozen regional reporters this week. And the same tightening that helps the margin hurts the equity: tangible common equity fell because market yields rose more than 100 basis points, well beyond the single Fed move, which is the price of being an asset-sensitive balance sheet with an available-for-sale book.

Venezuela steps back, the map widens

For two years the international deposit story was, functionally, a Venezuela story. In July the CEO was explicit that the inflows were “specifically tied to the oil production” — Carlos lafigliola, President and Chief Executive Officer · 2026-07-24 of a reopening economy. This quarter, Venezuelan deposits fell $96.8 million, or 3.9%.

The explanation is reasonable — “I see it more as a transaction decline more than a structural decline” — Carlos Iafigliola, President and CEO · 2026-10-23 — and it is corroborated by the other side of the ledger: non-Venezuelan international deposits rose $87.3 million, or 12%, with wealth balances up $77.9 million to $3.45 billion on $76.5 million of net new assets. The international deposit thesis has not broken; its centre of gravity has simply spread across roughly five countries, with Argentina and Central America picking up the slack. Management also reaffirmed the BSA program is a proof point rather than a constraint — no internal cap on international concentration, they said, only ALCO limits on single fund providers.

But the guidance got revised down to roughly $8.5 billion of total deposits, and the fourth-quarter mix shifts to 60/40 international versus domestic. That is a slower glide path than the pitch deck implied.

We identified several accounts that were carrying a very low interest expense... So the change was approximately 270 million going into that category due to the reclass. But at the same time, we were able to grow $100 million into the non interest bearing category.

That $270 million migration is the quarter's most optically powerful move: total deposits declined $109.6 million to $8.2 billion while the non-interest-bearing ratio jumped. Carlos's line — “those are non sensitive deposits that should have been DDAs since the beginning” — Carlos Iafigliola, President and CEO · 2026-10-23 — is almost certainly true, but it is a relabeling, not new money. The genuine signal is the $100 million of organic non-interest-bearing growth sitting beside it.

The turn to offense, and what it costs

The clearest evidence of a regime change is not in the income statement. It is in the vocabulary. Twelve months ago Amerant's keyword record was dominated by substandard loans, covenant testing, risk ratings, annual reviews, special-asset teams and a newly launched syndication program. This quarter's list reads: relationship based pricing, wealth management, deposit mix, share of wallet, residential lending, and a strengthened credit foundation. Triage language has been replaced by growth language. The syndication theme that was a marquee talking point three quarters ago rates barely a clause now.

What has not changed is the charge-off script. Thirty to thirty-five basis points was recited in October 2025, again in April 2026, and again this week. Meanwhile the provision actually rose to $6.2 million from $4.8 million on a $12.6 million increase in specific reserves across four commercial relationships, and the 12.6% drop in non-performing loans was driven by $80.3 million of payoffs, including four large relationships — resolution, not healing. A $5 million commercial loan was already repaid after quarter-end, which helps, but the pattern is consistent: credit improves when credits leave.

Capital return is the new lever. The board authorized up to $50 million of buybacks through the end of 2027, against a trailing quarterly pace in the low millions. The CEO's argument: “being between 1.38 to 1.45 I believe still represents a very attractive valuation.” — Carlos Iafigliola, President and CEO · 2026-10-23 At a $28.47 average repurchase price against $20.94 of tangible book, that is 1.36x tangible — and price to book has re-rated to 1.1x. Buying back stock above tangible book is accretive to earnings per share and dilutive to tangible book per share. Worth remembering the last cycle bought below tangible book; this one does not.

And the cost base is set to drift, not fall: roughly $68 million in the fourth quarter, then $69.5-$70 million in early 2027 because of hiring for growth. The path from 63.5% to 60% efficiency therefore runs almost entirely through revenue.

The bottom line

The tape already voted. AMTB is up 29% in ninety trading days, a near-straight line, while the full history still shows an 83% drawdown from the 2018 peak. A stock that has run that far into a print needs the guidance to be conservative; instead the fourth-quarter margin guide is flat-to-slightly-down, the deposit guide came in soft, and the headline ROA carries a six-basis-point assist from collection activity. Amerant has genuinely changed — the credit-repair era's language is gone and a capital-return era has begun, backed by real operating leverage. But the 1% is not yet self-sustaining. The next two quarters decide whether it is a runway or a plateau.