Esquire Financial Reports Q3 2026 Results and Completes Signature Merger

Esquire Financial Holdings, Inc. reported its financial results for the third quarter and year-to-date 2026 on October 27, 2026. The company announced the completion of its acquisition of Signature Bancorporation, Inc., the parent company of Signature Bank of Chicago, which closed on August 1, 2026.

The acquisition resulted in a combined balance sheet with approximately $4.75 billion in assets, $3.31 billion in loans, and $3.92 billion in deposits. The purchase price was $466.1 million, which included $246.9 million in goodwill and $49.3 million in core deposit intangible. The combination was approximately 10% accretive to tangible book value. Core systems conversions are currently in progress and are targeted for completion in April 2027.

For the third quarter of 2026, Esquire reported net income of $17.5 million, or $1.57 per diluted share. This represents a $4.5 million increase, or 34.7%, compared to the second quarter of 2026. Adjusted net income, which excludes $8.9 million in pretax merger expenses and $938 thousand in discrete tax benefits, was $23.6 million. The company reported an adjusted return on average assets of 2.34% and an adjusted return on average tangible common equity of 23.10%.

Loans increased by $1.52 billion, or 80.1%, to $3.43 billion from June 30, 2026. This growth was driven by $1.38 billion from the Signature merger and $159.6 million from organic litigation-related loan growth. Deposits increased by $1.80 billion, or 82.5%, to $3.98 billion during the same period. The company reported a net interest margin of 5.74% for the quarter.

Noninterest income increased to $7.9 million, representing 12.8% of total revenue. This growth was led by the payment processing platform, which serves 94,000 small business clients. The efficiency ratio was 58.6% for the current quarter, excluding merger expenses and core deposit intangible amortization.

Esquire maintains a strong capital foundation with a common equity tier 1 (CET1) ratio of 12.95% and a tangible common equity to tangible assets (TCE/TA) ratio of 10.91%. The company also noted that it was ranked #3 among top-performing publicly traded U.S. banks in Bank Director’s 2026 RankingBanking.