Pinnacle's adjusted EPS climbs 19% from a year earlier to $2.69 on fee income and loan and deposit growth

Pinnacle Financial Partners reported third-quarter 2026 net income available to common shareholders of $364 million, or $2.40 per diluted share, and adjusted earnings of $2.69 a share, as total revenue reached $1.31 billion from $544 million a year earlier. Pinnacle, a $130.7 billion asset regional bank, closed its merger with Synovus on Jan. 1, 2026 and cautions that year-over-year comparisons are significantly affected by the acquired balance sheet and purchase accounting.

President and CEO Kevin Blair said: "Three quarters into our first year as a combined company, the pattern that built Pinnacle is intact: consistent, repeatable performance, quarter after quarter." He added: "The merger changed our size, not how we perform."

Fee income and a lease payoff lift revenue as the linked-quarter margin narrows

Net interest income rose 3% from the second quarter to $986 million and was up 148% from a year earlier. The net interest margin fell 4 basis points quarter over quarter to 3.40%, which, according to the release, reflected increasing deposit costs and an ongoing, wholesale-funded liquidity build, partly offset by rising securities and loan yields. On a year-earlier basis the margin was 14 basis points wider, at 3.26% in third quarter 2025. Blair credits volume and fees rather than pricing: "Strong loan and deposit growth and outsized growth in fee income have driven double-digit diluted EPS growth year over year." Fee revenue did more of the work: non-interest revenue was $326 million against $247 million in the second quarter, and adjusted non-interest revenue was $323 million, up $53 million, or 19%. Two items explain most of that gain: stronger production lifted income from the equity-method investment in BHG, and other non-interest revenue included a $23 million gain from the payoff of an equipment lease. That lease gain is a one-time item that sits inside the adjusted revenue figure, so the underlying fee run rate deserves more attention than the headline percentage. Balance sheet growth was steady rather than dramatic: period-end loans were $89.81 billion and deposits $103.04 billion, up 2% from the second quarter on both lines, equal to $1.73 billion and $2.14 billion.

The gap between $2.40 and $2.69 is merger cost and a small gain on an investment disposition

Adjusted results remove a gain on disposition of investment, a $3 million Visa derivative valuation adjustment, $1 million of investment securities losses and $56 million of merger-related expense, then subtract an $11 million tax effect. Those five items reconcile the reported $364 million to the $409 million adjusted net income available to common shareholders that the release reports. For the nine months, the comparison inverts: reported diluted EPS was $5.36 against $5.96 a year earlier, a 10% decline, after $382 million of merger-related expense, while adjusted nine-month EPS was $7.59 versus $6.16. Share count supplies the rest of the answer: net income available to common shareholders rose 76% to $812 million, but the weighted average diluted share count rose 96% to 151.55 million after the merger, which is why the per-share result fell even as adjusted diluted EPS rose to $7.59 from $6.16.

Credit holds, capital builds and buybacks stay off the table

The net charge-off ratio was 0.23% against 0.22% in the second quarter, the non-performing asset ratio held at 0.50%, and the provision for credit losses was $86 million. The allowance for credit losses was 1.19% of loans and covered non-performing loans 245.78%; the release says the quarter-over-quarter change reflected a more adverse macroeconomic outlook and continued loan growth. The preliminary CET1 ratio rose to 10.01% from 9.93%, and the slide deck keeps 10.25% as its CET1 objective while saying no share repurchases are expected in 2026. The efficiency ratio was 56.6% and the adjusted tangible efficiency ratio 48.9%, against 59.4% and 49.8% respectively in the second quarter.

An unchanged 2026 outlook and a call on October 22

Management left its 2026 ranges where they were. The deck keeps adjusted revenue on a taxable equivalent basis at $5.00 billion to $5.20 billion, period-end loans excluding the purchase accounting mark at $91.0 billion to $93.0 billion, period-end deposits at $106.5 billion to $108.5 billion and adjusted non-interest expense at $2.675 billion to $2.775 billion. The ranges themselves carry no change, but the deck now assumes 2026 adjusted non-interest revenue of $1.175 billion to $1.185 billion and forecast BHG investment income of $150 million to $160 million. It puts fourth-quarter net interest income (TE) at $1.02 billion to $1.04 billion, about 2% to 4% above the third quarter, and keeps net charge-offs at 0.20% to 0.25% of average loans. Pinnacle holds its earnings call at 8 a.m. ET on Oct. 22, 2026. Purchase accounting is still preliminary, with $640 million of remaining accretable loan marks that can move the reported figures until the measurement period closes.