PNC, Huntington report lease financing uptick

Regional equipment financiers PNC Bank and Huntington Bank saw growth in their lease financing and commercial and industrial portfolios during the first quarter. 

Huntington lease financing grows 8% YoY 

Columbus, Ohio-based Huntington Bank’s lease financing portfolio totaled $5.5 billion in Q1, up 1% quarter over quarter and 7.8% year over year, according to last week’s earnings supplement. Huntington’s commercial and institutional loan outstandings landed at $57.6 billion in Q1, up 4.5% QoQ and 13.8% YoY.  

The bank’s C&I portfolio rose $209 million due to seasonally higher balances within distribution finance, Steve Steinour, chairman, president and chief executive officer of Huntington, said during the company’s April 17 earnings call.  

However, tariffs are a concern, he said. 

“There are other areas, like distribution finance, for example, where there’s some import restriction being felt through tariffs, and that utilization has dropped off a bit,” he said. “Equipment finance, where some of what we finance gets imported and decisions to defer have been made, but again, [on] a broad spectrum, there are winners not just losers. 

The bank reported net recoveries of 0.33%, compared with net charge-offs of 0.06% in the previous quarter and 0.01% in Q1 2025. The bank’s allowance for credit losses on lease financing totaled $60 million, down 6.3% QoQ and 17.6% YoY.  

PNC lease financing up 2%  

Pittsburgh-based PNC Financial Services’ equipment lease financing portfolio reached $6.7 billion in Q1, up 3.5% YoY, according to its April 15 earnings supplement. The company’s total commercial and industrial portfolio totaled $177.3 billion, essentially unchanged YoY. 

In addition, PNC’s net charge-offs for equipment lease financing decreased 50% YoY in Q1 to $3 million, while commercial and industrial portfolio charge-offs decreased 4.6% YoY to $68 million, according to the earnings supplement. Nonperforming equipment finance assets increased 53.8% YoY to $20 million to end Q1. 

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