Southcoast Financial Reports Q1 EPS $0.23

Southcoast Financial Corporation SOCB announced that it had unaudited net income of $1,243,000, or $0.23 per basic share, for the quarter ended March 31, 2012. This compares to unaudited net loss of $579,000, or $0.11 per basic share, for the quarter ended March 31, 2011. The March 31, 2012 income per share is based on 5,316,633 basic average shares compared to 5,270,053 basic average shares for the first quarter of 2011. "The first quarter's results were impacted by a decrease in operating expenses, gains on the sale of impaired assets, security gains and a reduction in our loan loss provision," said L. Wayne Pearson, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. "While we continue to work diligently on improving our asset quality, we continue to maintain strong capital levels and are encouraged by an improvement in our net core earnings over the quarter ended March 31, 2011." Net interest income decreased $56,000 from $3,233,000 for the first quarter of 2011 to $3,177,000 for the first quarter of 2012. A reduction in interest income due to volume decreases in average loans and securities was almost completely offset by the reduction of interest cost as existing liabilities repriced. The Company's annualized net interest margin improved by 19 basis points to 3.46% for the first quarter of 2012 from 3.27% for the first quarter of 2011, due to the significant reduction in our cost of funds.