"This was a good quarter as we had solid core financial performance, strong loan production, made significant progress reducing (higher- paying) public deposits (which are from state and local city and county entities), controlled our expenses and maintained excellent asset quality," First Hawaiian Chairman and CEO Bob Harrison told analysts on an earnings conference call. First Hawaiian's core net income, which does not include nonrecurring items, was $70.8 million, or 52 cents a share, to beat analysts' consensus estimate by a penny. Core earnings from a year ago were $57 million, or 41 cents a share.