Encore Capital Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:ECPG) Q4 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

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Jonathan Clark: Well, I think, Mark, as we’ve said in the past, if we saw some extraordinary opportunities, it could grow above 3%, but we’d always have to see a very clear line back down. I’d have to say, given that we’re buying so heavily in the U.S., where as you know, the speed with which cash comes back is faster than in other parts of the world. If we have what I’ll call a steady-ish, if that’s a phrase, level of deployments that we would not move above 3.0%. But I don’t want to take off the possibility that given the opportunity, we might, for a brief period of time.

Mark Hughes: Yes. And then one more, if I might. Ashish, you suggested that the adjustment in the U.S. was really more of a forecasting challenge rather than a collection challenge. Is that to say that the collections performance Q3 to Q4 was reasonably steady? I think, you said earlier that the consumer was — consumer behavior is stable. But just in your curves, you had expected something else to happen. And so therefore, as you say, a forecasting error rather than a collection issue, is that right?

Ashish Masih: Yes, Mark. So, I would say forecasting adjustments, right, not error, but — so there’s a process, there’s a kind of principles we have, and we monitor certain vintages, certain performance and make adjustments as appropriate and sometimes it takes a few quarters to get them adjusted. So, these adjustments were pretty much in 2021 and — all of them were actually, more than 100% or ’21 and ’22 vintages, and which were purchased at the peak of the pandemic. So, we’ve just been monitoring the performance and adjusting them steadily. And as you saw, we took a larger adjustment — as you kind of felt confident of kind of where these are headed, we took that larger adjustment in Q4 in 2023 to get them aligned. So, we feel we’ve captured all that we know to-date. There’s still very strong vintages, 2.3 times and 2.1 times. So profitable, good collections, just forecasting catching up to kind of post-pandemic world of normal consumer behavior in the U.S.

Mark Hughes: Thank you very much.

Operator: Thank you. And this concludes the Q&A session. I will turn it back to Mr. Masih for final comments.

Ashish Masih: As we close the call, I would like to reiterate a few important points. We believe Encore is truly differentiated in our sector, with a solid track record of operating results and superior capabilities. As the consumer credit cycle continues to turn, the U.S. market is seeing the world’s strongest supply growth. This is the portion of the credit cycle we’ve been waiting for. We continue to apply a disciplined portfolio purchasing approach by allocating record amounts of capital to the U.S. market, which has the highest returns. When combined with our effective collections operation, we believe this approach will enable 2024 to be a turning point in our operational and financial results. Thanks for taking the time to join us and we look forward to providing our first quarter 2024 results in May.

Operator: And thank you all for joining our call today. You may now disconnect.

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