Matthew Howlett: No, look, that would be absolutely terrific, especially given you’re really taking on no credit risk. You said maybe over time, you could add some of these loans to the book, but now this is just what the origination fee. And that’s it?
Andrew Murstein: Yes, we’ll probably hold a paper for anywhere from 30 to 90 days, a little bit of paper, and they’re all 760-type FICO scores, so a quality paper.
Matthew Howlett: Going forward, do you think — I know you said you had some misses on the fintech side. But what do you think in terms of doing more deals like this? It seems like with the bank and some of these fintech companies out there, is there room to do other asset classes? Are you talking to other people? Anything exciting?
Andrew Murstein: And the misses aren’t strikeouts. They’re just kind of you’ve taken the pitch, meaning that you’re not losing money, but it’s not adding anything to the bottom line. So exactly as you said, Matt, it’s a fee business, so there’s very little downside here. And the ROEs, if you look at the other banks that are public and that are in this sector, they’re north of — well north of 20%, 25%. So if done right, it’s a very profitable business. Yes, the hope would be to add on another player like this next year or so. As good as this business is, you can’t grow too fast because you have compliance risk here. So the bank — our bank has an exceptional reputation with regulators. They do a great job for us, and you don’t want to kind of stumble just for the sake of growth by adding on volume.
So they’ve been doing it very prudently. And I think we’ve been in it for 3 or so years now, so it’s kind of mature to the point where potentially it could start to take off.
Anthony Cutrone: Yes. I think the compliance is key for us, and there’s a cost associated with that. So where other players in this space might be able to just originate massive, massive amounts of volumes and operate on a margin of 5 to 10 basis points, that model just doesn’t work for us. We’re not willing to jeopardize our franchise to operate on that thin of a margin. So compliance is the key issue here. And if we — if this works and we can get more partners just like it, we’re open to that, and that’s what we’re going to look to do.
Matthew Howlett: Look, I got to commend you. I mean the ROE is clearly moving in the right direction. With the growth, the buyback, things like this really just go to improve an already pretty industry-leading ROE. So I got to congratulate you guys, and keep up the good work.
Andrew Murstein: Thank you. Appreciate it.
Operator: At this time, we are showing no further questioners in the queue, and this does conclude our question-and-answer session. I would now like to turn the conference back over to Andrew Murstein for any closing remarks.
Andrew Murstein: Thank you again for joining us this morning. We’re off to a great start of the year as you just heard. Each of our business segments has been part of this performance and have helped us navigate the current environment very well. Our teams are doing an excellent job of balancing growth of our loan portfolio and net interest income while maintaining high credit standards. We remain focused on delivering shareholder value, including earnings, our dividend and periodic repurchases of our common stock. As always, if you have any questions, please feel free to contact our Investor Relations team. The contact information is on the last page of our earnings supplement as well as the IR section of our website. Thank you again, and have a great rest of your day.
Operator: The conference has now concluded. Thank you for attending today’s presentation, and you may now disconnect.
