OppFi Inc. (NYSE:OPFI) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

Todd Schwartz: Yes, I will. I can pull the number for you while I’m talking, but we’re going to pull for you. But it’s interesting you say that. So OppFi has never been an aggressive collector of debt. We have always been a humanistic, value-based recovery strategy where we treat people with dignity and respect, and we’ve continued to do that. But that doesn’t mean that product features like a portal, a self-service payment portal, for settlement offers, for collecting on people’s loans, and making it easier for customers to pay with more debit card integrations and abilities to pay, is really where we’re seeing a lot of the pickup, right? And so how we treat our customers and our thoughts around that, they are never going to be aggressive. And €“ but we do make sure that we give customers options and we’re prudent on follow-ups and settlement offers to make sure that we’re successful.

Mike Grondahl: Got it. Thank you.

Todd Schwartz: And Pam has pulled the numbers. I think you had a question on the increase. Go ahead.

Pam Johnson: Sure. Mike, we had about $12 million in recoveries in 2021, and we had over $15 million in 2022.

Mike Grondahl: Got it. Okay. Great. Thank you.

Operator: Our next question comes from the line of David Scharf with JMP Securities. Please proceed with your question.

David Scharf: Hi, good afternoon. Thanks for taking my questions. I had a few I wanted to touch on. One is somewhat guidance related. But we obviously got good color from you directionally on the expected pace of losses, given the credit tightening mid-year, last year, and how those run off. Can you give us a sense for how to frame what you think of is a normalized loss rate? Obviously, 2021 was depressed based on stimulus. Late 2022 is elevated based on some of those vintages that were originated with neobanks and other sources. Where should we be ending this year if we should think of the end of €˜23 as a more normalized level?

Todd Schwartz: Yes. It’s a good question. And I’ll take the first question of the target of . So historically, OppFi has been around 10 years now. We’ve achieved mid to €“ mid-30s percentage of revenue, that has historically been where the business operates very efficiently and where we’ve had it. I think that obviously spiked this year, but our goal is to get that back down into the mid-30s in a normalized environment. I think this year, we still have a little bit flowing through in the first quarter. Obviously, we’re optimistic on what we’re seeing on that front and feel really, really good. But we are still dealing with some of that but feel like we’re going to make significant progress if things continued the way they are looking as far as our early indicators.

David Scharf: Got it. Understood. Todd, I also wanted to just dig a little more into some of the strategic initiatives you were talking about, and specifically, you made reference to sort of product and asset adjacencies. And I guess, I’ll just play devil’s advocate for a moment. Historically, the equity markets haven’t been very kind to consumer lenders that have branched out very often expanding their products in €“ under the guise of, there is a lot of different ways to serve our existing customer. Even if well-founded, very often sticking to the knitting strategy has been rewarded mostly. Can you talk about, just given where your market share is now, the opportunity in front of you with just your core lending business, maybe what the thought process is about expanding corporate development activities as opposed to just staying focused on the core product?