NEW YORK, March 13, 2026, 10:24 EDT
Huntington Bancshares (HBAN) hovered at $15.50 Friday morning, barely budging after six consecutive losses. Thursday’s close landed at $15.48, off 1.0%. The stock remains about 20% under its Feb. 6 high of $19.46.
Huntington spent the week assuring investors its 2026 roadmap still stands, even as shares slumped. The bank, in materials filed for the RBC Global Financial Institutions Conference, stuck to its first-quarter performance and reiterated unchanged 2026 guidance. Huntington also put earnings per share for 2027 at $1.90 to $1.93.
It’s been a mixed picture. On Friday, Wall Street edged up as oil prices pulled back, yet bank stocks faced their own crosscurrents: Investors were digesting new efforts from the Federal Reserve to ease Basel capital regulations—the rules that dictate banks’ required loss-absorbing buffers. “Quite friendly to banks,” is how Ian Katz, managing director at Capital Alpha Partners, described the proposed rewrite. Reuters
Huntington stuck to its guns on forecasts. The bank reiterated a 10% to 13% jump for 2026 net interest income—essentially the spread between loan earnings and deposit costs. Noninterest income, they said, is still on track for a 13% to 16% increase. For the fourth quarter, Huntington aims to push its efficiency ratio below 55%.
The bank has already bought back $150 million in shares and is now projecting roughly $550 million in buybacks for 2026, with that number jumping to $1.1 billion–$1.2 billion a year later in 2027. “Q1 looks really good,” Chief Financial Officer Zach Wasserman told investors, adding that trends in the first quarter are still lining up with the full-year guidance. Securities and Exchange Commission
Getting the acquisitions right is still the linchpin. Huntington expects Cadence cost synergies to hit full run-rate by Q4 2026, Veritex by Q2, and says combined run-rate expense savings should reach $435 million in 2027. President Brant Standridge noted that, of the 6,500 Cadence employees, 66 have exited since the merger was announced.
Friday’s action saw Fifth Third tack on almost 1%. KeyCorp hovered flat. Citizens Financial slipped roughly 0.8%. Huntington landed somewhere in the middle, as regional-bank stocks chopped around.
The cleaner growth narrative, though, carries a heftier regulatory price tag. In its annual filing Thursday, Huntington flagged that the Cadence acquisition will likely push its average assets past $250 billion in the fourth quarter of 2026. That shift bumps the bank into the tougher Category III tier for large U.S. lenders, after a transition period. The move triggers tighter rules on liquidity, leverage, and stress testing.
Management insists market swings aren’t denting the business, and customer strength hasn’t cracked. Still, investors want to see actual evidence—loan and deposit growth, merger savings—in future results before they’re willing to bet the stock can recover more losses.
