“As we look forward, we're carefully watching the impact of higher rates on our customers and expect to see deposit balances and credit quality continue to return toward pre-pandemic levels.”

In context

“iority, and it will continue to take actions necessary to achieve its goal. We are starting to see the impact on consumer spend, credit, housing, and demands for goods and services. At this point, the impact to consumers and businesses has been manageable. And though there will certainly be some industries and segments of consumers that are more impacted than others, the rate impact we see in our customer base is not materially -- I'm sorry, the rate of impact we see in our customer base is not materially accelerating. This plus the strength with which consumers and businesses went into this slowing economy is a helpful set of facts as we look forward. Our customers have remained resilient with deposit balances, consumer spending and credit quality still stronger than pre-pandemic levels. As we look forward, we're carefully watching the impact of higher rates on our customers and expect to see deposit balances and credit quality continue to return toward pre-pandemic levels. While we're not predicting a severe downturn, we must be prepared for one, and we are stronger company today than one and two years ago. Our margins are wider, our returns are higher, we're better managed, and our capital position is strong, so we feel prepared for a downside scenario if we see broader deterioration than we currently see or predict. We still have clear opportunities to improve our performance as we make progress on our efficiency initiatives and continue to make the investments necessary to grow the business through technology and product enhancements. Two years ago, we shared a path to higher ROTCE by returning capital to our shareholders and executing on our efficiency initiatives. While high levels of operating losses in the second half of '22 impacted our results, our”