Upbound Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:UPBD) Q2 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

We didn’t forecast it to the exact same degree as the first half of the year. Being a little conservative there, but we don’t expect them to go back either because, again, we’re more pre-pandemic levels now, not below that or anything where you would expect them to spike back up in 2024.

Fahmi Karam: Yes. Bobby, just to add to that a little bit. I think the second quarter, obviously, was a really strong quarter for us really across the board. But thinking kind of long-term as far as kind of adjusted EBITDA margins, we don’t necessarily think 16% to 17% range for Acima as the right EBITDA margin. I don’t know if that’s sustainable, especially as we kind of prioritize growth in GMV. We still think that low-double digits to low teens with room to improve on the loss rate that we produced this quarter is kind of the right range for the Acima business. And then on the Rent-A-Center side, long-term, we still think it’s a high-teens margin business. Losses continued to improve this quarter. But I would say, long-term, we still think there’s room to improve losses on both segments.

Robert Griffin: Thank you. I appreciate the details. Best of luck during the third quarter.

Mitchell Fadel: Thanks, Bobby.

Operator: Thank you. Please standby for our next question.

Mitchell Fadel: Kyle, I think you’re next on our queue.

Kyle Joseph: Okay. Thanks. Sorry. I didn’t hear my name announced. Apologies. Thanks guys. Thanks for taking the questions. Just wanted to get a sense for – and it might be helpful to do by segment Acima versus RAC. But just the health of the underlying consumer, obviously, you guys talked about the – what’s going on with early buy-outs and then we weigh inflation and low unemployment. And obviously, your underwriting changes have had the desired impacts. But give us a sense for where you think the consumer is as they kind of adapted to the inflationary environment? And then maybe on a year-over-year basis, is the consumer a lot more comfortable here? But yes – and if you can do it by segment, that would be helpful.

Mitchell Fadel: Yes. I would say, starting with the Rent-A-Center segment, what we’ve seen through numerous economic downturns, it’s a pretty resilient consumer and they adjust pretty quickly to make ends meet. Last year was a bit of a struggle because the inflation rate was so historically high. But yes, we’ve seen the adjustment by that consumer. You can see it in our delinquency and our loss rates. There’s still more room to come down. Of course, our underwriting has been a big part of that. But you’re not seeing us having to cut off a tremendous amount of demand when you start talking about mid single-digit negative numbers on the Rent-A-Center and the Acima side when you think about the growth metrics. In the Rent-A-Center side, sequentially, that’s two quarters in a row where it’s improved sequentially on the revenue or the same-store sales.

So let’s say that customers adjusted. On the Acima side, the same thing. Acima will see and sees the trade-down benefit faster and more so than Rent-A-Center because it’s direct, right? When you’re in a retail store, you can get that directly the trade-down benefit versus having to – on the Rent-A-Center side hope if somebody gets turned down somewhere for consumer credit, then they have to go to Rent-A-Center, go to rentacenter.com obviously, where it’s more direct in retail waterfall. So the consumers definitely adjusted some benefits to trade-down and the yields are good. The losses and delinquency are coming in line, and we’re getting better from a growth metric standpoint on both Rent-A-Center and Acima sequentially for numerous quarters in a row.