Pathward Financial, Inc. (NASDAQ:CASH) Q1 2024 Earnings Call Transcript

Brett Pharr: Well, Mike, as you know, we’re in an innovative business that is changing over time. There will be, at some point, some use of capital. But at these prices and for a while these — this level of stock, there’s not a better use of our capital than to buy the shares. And we get up into a period of 12 or something then we’ll have a different conversation. But right now, I can’t get an ROE on capital that’s better than what I’ll get by buying back shares.

Michael Perito: Okay. And is there, as you guys think about, obviously, not bank, but non-bank M&A. Has that environment or your views on those types of opportunities that would be maybe interesting changed or altered at all? Is there I guess one thing I would say is there’s always kind of that the constant thought of how you guys not build on top of the regulatory advantage, right, which has been a great move for you guys. And it feels like technology could be that next leg up. Just wondering how you guys are thinking about that? And is the M&A tool in that or not necessarily given where the market is today?

Brett Pharr: Well, I think it’s a tool. I think it’s a tool we’ve looked at. I would reiterate my prior comment about capital and the proper use of capital. But I have to tell you, we’re looking at all kinds of things as we invest in technology. We are in a fairly unique niche and being able to go and buy something that properly and I emphasize that word, properly does what we needed to do is fairly limited. There’s a lot of Fintech kind of things that have put middleware layer services in this industry, and it’s actually caused a lot of problems. And we looked at those and they just didn’t meet the standards that we had. So I think decision point one is what’s the right use of capital. Decision point two is there anything out there that actually would give us an advantage from a technology perspective?

Michael Perito: Great. Thank you guys for taking the questions and for the call. I appreciate it.

Brett Pharr: Thanks, Mike.

Greg Sigrist: Thanks, Mike.

Operator: Thank you for your questions. There are currently no questions in queue. [Operator Instructions] There are no questions waiting at this time. So I’ll pass the conference back to the management team for any closing remarks.

Brett Pharr: Thanks for joining the call today and this ends our call.

Operator: This will conclude today’s conference call. Thank you all for your participation. You may now disconnect your lines.