National Bank of Canada Q1 2021 Earnings Call Transcript

The following is excerpted from the question-and-answer section of the transcript.

Question: Sohrab Movahedi - BMO Capital Markets Equity Research - Analyst : Laurent, congratulations on your appointment. Louis, question for you. Over the recent quarters, especially, pre-pandemic and then throughout the pandemic, I think you have told us that you have been incredibly selective in growth pre-pandemic. And I think as recently as the last couple of quarters, you'd indicated that you are aggressively in pursuit of top line growth. And I guess what I'm trying to get a feel for is, if you had to, on a scale of 1 to 10, give us a feel for how much of your aspired growth is actually being realized right now as far as still undercome? That would be helpful. Let me know if that actually makes sense, the question. I'm just trying to get a sense for whether or not what we're seeing here this quarter is as good as it gets? Or do you expect this is just the beginning? REFINITIV STREETEVENTS | www.refinitiv.com | Contact Us consent of Refinitiv. 'Refinitiv' and the Refinitiv logo are registered trademarks of Refinitiv and its affiliated companies. FEBRUARY 24, 2021 / 6:00PM, NA.TO - Q1 2021 National Bank of Canada Earnings Call

Question: Sohrab Movahedi - BMO Capital Markets Equity Research - Analyst : I think you did. And just for crystal clarity, what you did in this quarter, while you're talking about, for example, for the balance of year when Ghislain is talking about mid-single-digit pretax pre-provision growth and the like, this is all still within the context of being prudent on the businesses that you're pursuing, or basically, as you put it, not being in a risk-on environment? Like in other words, once we get into a bit of a risk-on environment that would be, I guess, additional fuel. Is that the right way to think about it?

Question: Sohrab Movahedi - BMO Capital Markets Equity Research - Analyst : I just hope one of these days, Louis, when you have results like this, you don't say you're satisfied, you say you're ecstatic. REFINITIV STREETEVENTS | www.refinitiv.com | Contact Us consent of Refinitiv. 'Refinitiv' and the Refinitiv logo are registered trademarks of Refinitiv and its affiliated companies. FEBRUARY 24, 2021 / 6:00PM, NA.TO - Q1 2021 National Bank of Canada Earnings Call

Question: Gabriel Dechaine - National Bank Financial, Inc., Research Division - Analyst : A question for Louis to start. You'd mentioned in your opening remarks about, once the restrictions are lifted, you want to get back to raising dividends and buying back stock. I assume you mean your intent to do both? And if that's the case, are we looking at 11% still as a minimum target level for core Tier 1?

Question: Gabriel Dechaine - National Bank Financial, Inc., Research Division - Analyst : Okay. And then my other question is to -- is for Laurent, also congrats on the new job. Great quarter in Financial Markets, but we're staring down a barrel of some really tough costs over the next 3 quarters. How does that impact, I guess, your outlook for pretax pre-provision profit growth, like where do you expect Financial Markets to end up vis-a-vis the mid- to high single-digit all bank target? And then in terms of -- I think you alluded to trading may be slowing down. Is that the offset going to be that solid pipeline of investment banking fees coming?

Question: Gabriel Dechaine - National Bank Financial, Inc., Research Division - Analyst : So maybe not a big dropoff as I might think anyway.