First Republic Bank Reports Strong First Quarter

reported a strong first quarter on Monday. The San Francisco-based firm's EPS rose 27 percent year-over-year to $0.85, easily topping estimates of $0.73. Revenue climbed 4.7 percent to $323.75 million, beating the Wall Street consensus of about $320 million.

First Republic's loans remained about flat for the quarter, rising a very modest 0.6 percent to $28 billion. Loans for commercial business, commercial real estate and single family homes remained flat year-over-year. Unsecured loans and lines of credit saw the sharpest drop, declining 12 percent for the quarter. And, “other secured” loans saw a substantial drop of nine percent. HELOC's and multifamily/commercial construction loans declined, as well, losing 4.9 and three percent, respectively. Meanwhile, multifamily home loans soared nine percent while single family construction and stock secured loans increased seven and four percent, respectively.

Deposits surged 15 percent to $26.9 billion. The increase was likely due to the strengthening economy as more Americans get back to work and deposit their earnings into banks.

First Republic's wealth management assets soared 60 percent to $35.3 billion. Also, the company's wealth management fees rose 71 percent year-over-year, finishing at $29.6 million.

First Republic has increased its quarterly dividend from $0.10 to $0.12 per share of common stock. The first quarter dividend will be paid on May 15 to shareholders of record as of May 1.

On January 23, First Republic announced that Senior VP Mike Selfridge was named its Deputy COO. A few days later, Senior VP Jason Bender was named its chief administrative officer. Then, in March, the company named Reynold Levy to its board of directors. Levy is also the president of the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in New York.

On April 3,

that a man who allegedly robbed a First Republic location in Redwood City, California, had been apprehended. While bank robberies occur all the time, the manner in which the suspect was captured was a bit different than the norm. Conventional wisdom says for employees to call the police and count their blessings after a robbery. However, the teller decided to initiate a manhunt on his own. According to the report, he followed the suspect after the holdup and phoned updates to the police. The suspect was ultimately arrested with the money on him at the entrance to a nearby shopping center. Interestingly, although the suspect admitted the robbery to the police, he pleaded “not guilty” in court.

After closing at $40 on Friday, First Republic has dropped below $39.70 as of this writing. And, there doesn't appear to be any significant reason for the decline. First Republic is down around 0.5 percent on Monday.