360 DigiTech, Inc. (NASDAQ:QFIN) Q3 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Alex Xu: Yes. I probably want to add one little point here, is that, this year, in 2023 because the macro factors and also because the first half of the year, we are facing a tough comp in terms of pricing versus last year. That’s why you see the profitability growth is slower than the loan volume growth for 2023. And I would say, these kind of negative factors related to profitability is already behind us. So in the future years, we will try to at least maintain the same pace in terms of between the volume and the profitability. If anything, we try to also drive some additional operating leverages in the future. Thank you, Cindy.

Operator: Our next question comes from the line of Yada Li from CICC. Please go ahead.

Yada Li: Then, I’ll do my translation. Hello management, thanks for taking my question. This is Yada [Technical difficulty].

Wu Haisheng: Okay. Because we understand your question, so we can go ahead and answer this question. Okay. Regarding the take rate, I would say, in the short run, we will see some fluctuation in terms of our credit costs and funding costs. In this regard, we will further fine-tune our operations, optimize our funding structure and invest more resources into R&D to improve our operational efficiency and funding costs. With those cost and efficiency improved, we will mitigate largely the fluctuation. So we will see the take rate maintain stable in the short term. Actually, if you look at the — our take rate in Q3, it’s actually improved sequentially from apple-to-apple perspective with diversified services offered to our users and optimizing our asset allocation.

But because we expanded our customer outreach in Q3 and adding on additional tax costs related to our dividend and the share buyback program, it looks like our take rate in Q3 maintained stable from last quarter. From a long-term perspective, we will further improve our operational efficiency, and we do hope to see a steady increase in our take rate.

Operator: I see no more questions from the phone line. I would like to hand the call back to management for closing remarks.

Alex Xu: Okay. Thanks again for everyone joining us for the call. If you have additional questions, please feel free to contact us off-line. Thank you. Have a good day.

Operator: Ladies and gentlemen, that concludes today’s conference call. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect your lines.