Commitments and Contingent Liabilities

12 Months Ended

Dec. 31, 2016

Commitments and Contingencies Disclosure [Abstract]

Commitments and Contingent Liabilities

NOTE 18. COMMITMENTS AND CONTINGENT LIABILITIES

Commitments—In the normal course of business, WesBanco offers off-balance sheet credit arrangements to enable its customers to meet their financing objectives. Those instruments involve, to varying degrees, elements of credit and interest rate risk in excess of the amount recognized in the financial statements. WesBanco’s exposure to credit losses in the event of non-performance by the other parties to the financial instruments for commitments to extend credit and standby letters of credit is limited to the contractual amount of those instruments. WesBanco uses the same credit policies in making commitments and conditional obligations as for all other lending. Commitments generally have fixed expiration dates or other termination clauses and may require payment of a fee. Since many of the commitments are expected to expire without being drawn upon, the total commitment amounts do not necessarily represent future cash requirements. The allowance for credit losses associated with commitments was $0.6 million as of December 31, 2016 and 2015, and is included in other liabilities on the Consolidated Balance Sheets.

Letters of credit are conditional commitments issued by banks to guarantee the performance of a customer to a third party. Those guarantees are primarily issued to support public and private borrowing arrangements, including normal business activities, bond financing and similar transactions. Letters of credit are considered guarantees. The liability associated with letters of credit was $0.2 million as of December 31, 2016 and 2015.

Contingent obligations to purchase loans funded by other entities include affordable housing plan guarantees, credit card guarantees and mortgages sold into the secondary market with recourse. Affordable housing plan guarantees are performance guarantees for various building project loans. The guarantee amortizes as the loan balances decrease. Credit card guarantees are credit card balances not owned by WesBanco, whereby the Bank guarantees the performance of the cardholder. Certain mortgages sold with recourse obligate WesBanco to repurchase mortgages sold if the borrower exceeds certain delinquency metrics within the first year.

The following table presents total commitments to extend credit, guarantees and various letters of credit outstanding:

	December 31,
(in thousands)	2016		2015
Lines of credit	$	1,418,329	$	1,159,769
Loans approved but not closed		185,254		234,599
Overdraft limits		126,517		106,252
Letters of credit		32,907		27,408
Contingent obligations to purchase loans funded by other entities		13,036		18,079

Contingent Liabilities—WesBanco is a party to various legal and administrative proceedings and claims. While any litigation contains an element of uncertainty, management does not believe that a material loss related to such proceedings or claims pending or known to be threatened is reasonably possible.