Fair Isaac Corporation (NYSE:FICO) Q1 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Surinder Thind: Got it. And just a clarification on that, Steve. So is the partner side holding steady at this point? Or €“ and it’s €“ the drag is mostly from the myFICO side?

Steve Weber: Yes, it’s mostly on the myFICO side because the myFICO side is more €“ the partners have a lot of different business models they can cycle off to, right? There’s a premium MyFICO side, we don’t set what market it is. It’s a lot more tied to each market.

Surinder Thind: Got it. And then one quick question on just capital allocation. The stock has obviously performed really well over the past year and especially over the previous quarter. So does this still kind of make sense to be fully allocating all of your free cash flow towards share repurchases? Or should we start to think about maybe paying down some of the floating rate debt at this point?

William Lansing: We’re still in love with our stock, and the plan is to continue to return capital to shareholders through stock repurchase. That said, we’ll keep an eye on rates. And we’re at a weighted 4.9% on the interest expense right now. And I just €“ when I look at FICO stock, when you look at FICO stock, I think you believe that’s a better €“ that’s a good balance. So for now, still on stock buyback.

Surinder Thind: Understood. That’s all with my questions.

Operator: Our next question is from Kyle Peterson with Needham & Company. Please go ahead your line is open.

Kyle Peterson: Great. Thanks, guys. So I just wanted to get your, like, sense of appetite. I guess, like you guys just mentioned FICO stock is really attractive. But how are you guys feeling about the buyback and capital allocation in this environment? And kind of if you could rank order, Steve, your like use of capital, that would be really helpful?

Steve Weber: Yes. Okay, Kyle, that’s a good question. So one of the things we’re really working on hard, frankly, is we’re bringing back as much cash as we can from around the world. Even if there’s a slight expense to that when the rates are higher, it just makes more sense to do that as much as possible. So that we’re bringing as much cash into the U.S. as we can. And then we look at the trade-offs between the rates and to put what kind of stock we can buy back. So as Will said, we’re concentrating on buybacks, but that can change as the markets change. So we look at that, we model it out. And we’re still comfortable that buying as many shares back as we can conceivably. We’re not going to do like we did last year where we went all in, and we ratcheted up our debt when we said we had the opportunity. But I think you’ll see us spending the free cash flow this year on buybacks.

Kyle Peterson: Yes. I mean, that makes sense. And I mean I think you guys went hog-wild on it last year, but like, yes, we’re all about that. But I guess like just as we’re thinking into the next year, is there anything different? Or should we expect more or less cash flow? I guess that the messaging from you guys historically has been, cash flow is €“ it’s your money and shareholders’ and not ours, and we want to return that if we can’t find a better use of that. But is there any different messaging? Or is it more of the same with you at helm, at least for now?