Company: TFC
Filing Date: 2025-02-25
Form Type: 10-K
Source: 0000092230-25-000020
Chunk: 78

Company: TRUIST FINANCIAL CORP
Filing Date: 2025-02-25
Form: 10-K
Item: Item 1A
Chunk 78
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 operations, business, and prospects.

Market Risks

The levels of or changes in interest rates could adversely affect our results of operations and financial condition.

We are highly dependent on net interest income, which is the difference between interest income on earning assets, such as loans and investments, and interest expense on deposits and borrowings. Net interest income is significantly affected by market rates of interest, which in turn are influenced by monetary and fiscal policies, general economic and market conditions, including heightened levels of inflation, the political and regulatory environments, business and consumer sentiment, competitive pressures, and expectations about the future, including future changes in interest rates and the frequency and timing of such changes. Refer to the later risk factor titled Changes in monetary, fiscal, and other policies, and changes in the U.S. political environment, could adversely affect us. Our net interest income has in the past been adversely affected and could in the future be adversely affected by policies, laws, and events that have the effect of flattening or inverting the yield curve (that is, the difference between long-term and short-term interest rates), depressing the interest rates associated with our earning assets to levels near the rates associated with our interest expense, increasing the volatility of market rates of interest, including the rate of change, or changing the spreads among different interest rate indices.

The levels of or changes in interest rates could adversely affect us beyond our net interest income, including by increasing the cost or decreasing the availability of deposits or other variable-rate funding instruments, reducing the yield on or demand for loans or increasing the prepayment speed of loans, increasing client or counterparty delinquencies or defaults, and reducing the value of our loans, retained interests in securitizations, and fixed-income securities in our investment portfolio and the efficacy of our hedging strategies. Certain of our investment securities, notably MBS, are sensitive to changes in rates. Generally, when rates rise, market values will decline, prepayments of principal will decrease and the duration of MBS will increase. Conversely, when rates fall, market values will rise, prepayments of principal will increase and the duration of MBS will decrease.

The levels of and changes in market rates of interest, and the related risks and uncertainties, are beyond our control. The dynamics among these risks and uncertainties are also challenging to assess and manage. For example, while an accommodative monetary policy may benefit us to some degree by spurring economic activity among our clients, such a policy may ultimately cause us more harm by inhibiting our ability to grow or sustain