Renasant Corp. in Tupelo, Miss., said late Tuesday that its third-quarter earnings rose 13.5% from a quarter earlier, to $6.5 million, after the company recorded $5 million in securities gains.
The company's net interest margin expanded 16 basis points from a quarter earlier, to 3.92%. "As planned, we have steadily improved net interest margin over the past 4 quarters," said E. Robinson McGraw, Renasant's chairman, and chief executive, in a press release. "This improvement in net interest margin continues to be driven by our strategic efforts to restructure our funding mix and deploy cash into higher yielding alternatives."
This one-time securities gain helped drive noninterest income up 47% from the second quarter, to $19.6 million. Renasant also completed its purchase of a Birmingham, Ala., trust business during the third quarter.
Earnings for the $4 billion-asset company fell 67% from a year earlier, when Renasant had a $42 million bargain purchase gain from buying a failed bank from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.
