LEASES

12 Months Ended

Dec. 31, 2024

19. LEASES

A lease is defined as a contract, or part of a contract, that conveys the right to control the use of identified property, plant or equipment for a period of time in exchange for consideration. On January 1, 2019, the Company adopted ASU No. 2016-02 “Leases” (Topic 842) and all subsequent ASUs that modified Topic 842. For the Company, Topic 842 primarily affected the accounting treatment for operating lease agreements in which the Company is the lessee.

Lessee Accounting

Substantially all of the leases in which the Company is the lessee are comprised of real estate property for branches with terms extending through 2039. All of the Company’s leases are classified as operating leases, and therefore, were previously not recognized on the Company’s Consolidated Balance Sheet. With the adoption of Topic 842, operating lease agreements are required to be recognized on the consolidated statements of condition as right-of-use (“ROU”) assets and corresponding lease liabilities.

The following table represents the Consolidated Balance Sheet classification of the Company’s ROU assets and lease liabilities (in thousands). The Company elected not to include short-term leases (i.e., leases with initial terms of twelve months or less), on the Consolidated Balance Sheet.

	Balance at December 31,
Lease Type	2024		2023		Affected line item on the Consolidated Balance Sheet
Right of Use Assets
Operating	$	9,966	$	11,116	Other Assets

Lease Liabilities:
Operating	$	10,095	$	11,188	Other Liabilities

The calculated amount of the ROU assets and lease liabilities in the table above are impacted by the length of the lease term and the discount rate used to present value the minimum lease payments. The Company’s lease agreements often include one or more options to renew at the Company’s discretion. If at lease inception, the Company considers the exercising of a renewal option to be reasonably certain, the Company will include the extended term in the calculation of the ROU asset and lease liability. Regarding the discount rate, Topic 842 requires the use of the rate implicit in the lease whenever this rate is readily determinable. As this rate is rarely determinable, the Company utilizes its incremental borrowing rate at lease inception, on a collateralized basis, over a similar term. For operating leases existing prior to January 1, 2019, the rate for the remaining lease term as of January 1, 2019 was used. For leases obtained as of the HVBC acquisition, the rate for the remaining lease term as of June 16, 2023 was used. The following table displays the weighted average remaining lease term and the weighted average discount rate for the Company’s operating leases outstanding as of December 31, 2024:

	Operating
Weighted average term (years)		8.11
Weighted average discount rate		4.21	%

The following table represents lease costs and other lease information for the years ended December 31, 2024, 2023, and 2022, respectively (in thousands). As the Company elected not to separate lease and non-lease components and instead to account for them as a single lease component, the variable lease cost primarily represents variable payments such as common area maintenance and utilities.

	December 31,
Lease Cost	2024		2023		2022
Operating lease cost	$	1,953	$	1,400	$	728
Variable lease cost		250		177		64
Total lease cost	$	2,203	$	1,577	$	792

Future minimum payments for operating leases with initial or remaining terms of one year or more as of December 31, 2024 along with a reconciliation to the discounted amount recorded on the December 31, 2024 Consolidated Balance Sheet (in thousands):

Undiscounted cash flows due within	Operating
2025		1,779
2026		1,663
2027		1,644
2028		1,557
2029		1,324
2030 and thereafter		4,170
Total undiscounted cash flows		12,137
Impact of present value discount		2,042
Amount reported on balance sheet	$	10,095