And we’re going to feel that impact as the year goes on. But we feel really good about all of it. I think we’ve recalibrated our sales effort. We’ve taken it and gone back to, what I think, has been a unique and proven success with Intermex that no one has ever grown the Latin American business as quickly or as well as we had. And we’re back to the days of the very much the Intermex way. That was something that took us from a small, regional player to being a leader in the market. And I expect those results to be hugely impactful as we move into the second half of the year.
Mike Grondahl: Got it. And then earlier in the year, you said that your ‘24 guidance assumed, like, 3.5% industry growth, U.S. to Mexico. Is that 3.5% still kind of embedded in the 2024 guidance?
Andras Bende: Yes, Mike, I would say – this is Anders. I would say for now, it’s still close to that. We bumped it down a little bit. Fortunately, from an earnings perspective, we’ve done a great job on costs, so we’re able to make up a lot to get through to EBITDA and EPS. But I would say it’s near what we communicated before. We do have, coming up in the second half of the year, we do have some softness that we think we’re going to be able to get some uplift in terms of grow over that was more execution related that we think we’ve remedied. So we think we’ve still got a good shot to deliver.
Mike Grondahl: Got it. And then, Andras, did you break out with the acquisition of La Nacional and i-Transfer, I don’t know, the last four or five quarters, we’ve gotten a core or an organic growth number in addition to the revenue growth number, you guys reported a 3.5%, do you have the organic number?
Andras Bende: Yes. I think since we’ve had them in the portfolio long enough, we’re moving away from the breakout of those separate units.
Mike Grondahl: Okay. And then maybe lastly, guys, any comments on April and how that month went?
Bob Lisy: I think the most we could really say, because we – it’s obviously not finite for us, but for ourselves, we saw more – a little bit of a resurgence related to our growth numbers, which we expect because, as I said, we’ve kind of gone back to fundamentals in a way that we haven’t for years, and we’re seeing a turn of the tide. It’s way too early to declare victory or even to declare that we’re absolutely, solidly have everything in line for the resurgence, because I think it’ll take some time. But the numbers are encouraging from a transactional year-over-year perspective, more than they’ve been, particularly if we weigh into the fact that February market was a plus three, March was a minus three.
If that trend is continuing into February, we departed from the market significantly in a positive way as we moved into April. So we’re very encouraged. But more to come and more for us to watch that. I just also want to be clear that we’ve never been a company, and Andras has laid this out clearly as well, that’s been exclusively dependent upon what’s happening in the market. And I know that the numbers that you see today reflect a lot of what’s going on in the market, and we’re not immune to that, as no one is. But this company was built in 2009 through 2013 or 2014, when the market didn’t grow at all. We still believe that the way we apply our business at retail, with the new adjustments in terms of people and back to the very unique and different way that we go about consumer acquisition through our retailers that we can grow much faster than the marketplace.
And I think the early results on April are kind of indicative of that. But again, we need a little bit of a trendline here to see that for a few months before we declare that it’s absolutely working, but we’re very encouraged.
Mike Grondahl: Got it. Okay, thank you.
Operator: One moment for our next question. And our next question will be coming from Rufus Hone of BMO. Your line is open.
Rufus Hone: Hey, good morning, guys. Thanks for the question. Just coming back to the detail you gave on Slide 13 on the gross profit per transaction in digital. Any way you could sort of frame what percentage of digital transactions are those Intermex branded and what percentage are unbranded? Just trying to get a sense of the blended gross profit per digital transaction. Thanks.
Andras Bende: Intermex’s branded transactions, pretty much 40% to 45% of the total, the other 55% is a combination of different partners that we have.
Bob Lisy: By the way, when you say unbranded, I don’t want to correct that, but just want to make sure that we have all the data. They are co-branded, they require that. So we still are co-branding with the partner on those, exclusively branded us is the 45%.
Rufus Hone: Okay, got it. Got it. And do you think you can keep driving that gross profit per transaction up over time? I guess what gives you confidence about that trajectory? Thank you.
Bob Lisy: I think that the key isn’t really driving gross margin up, it’s now leveraging what is a really strong gross margin to drive more wires. We want to make sure that we’re reflective of the marketplace, which we believe Latin America is more like an 80-20 today, meaning 80% at retail and 20% at digital. And we want to move that number there now. We don’t want to sacrifice or give back gross margin. But as I spoke earlier, the key to this was, first, is to stake out a place where gross margin was very healthy, and then we can start to move from there and decide how we create programs, how we create repeat usage that leverages the high gross margin to drive even higher growth. So I think that’ll be the place you see us go.
I don’t think you see us try to get from a $5 margin to a $5.50 or $5.20 even, it’s more about trying to drive a much higher growth rate that will drive the business overall now that we’re in a very healthy position with gross margin.
Rufus Hone: Thanks very much.
Operator: And I am showing no further questions at this time. I would now like to turn the call back to Bob for closing remarks.
Bob Lisy: Thank you all for joining us. We look forward to talking to you soon. And have a great day. Thank you.
Operator: This concludes today’s conference call. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.
