Conn's, Inc.

Good morning and thank you for holding. Welcome to the CONS, Inc. conference call to discuss earnings for the fiscal quarter ended October 31st, 2021. My name is Melissa and I will be operator for today. During the presentation, all participants will be in a listen-only mode. After the speaker's remarks, you will be invited to participate in a question and answer session. As a reminder, this conference call is being recorded. The company's earnings release dated December 7, 2021, was distributed before market opening this morning and may be accessed via the company's investor relations website at ir.cons.com. During today's call, management will discuss, among other financial performance measures, adjusted net income and adjusted earnings per diluted share. Please refer to the company's earnings release that was issued today for a reconciliation of these non-GAAP measures to their most comparable GAAP measures. I must remind you that some of their statements made in this call are forward-looking statements within the meaning of the federal securities laws. These forward-looking statements represent the company's present expectations or beliefs concerning future events. The company cautions that such statements are necessarily based on certain assumptions which are subject to risks and uncertainties which could cause actual results to differ materially from those indicated today. Your speakers today are Kendra Holt, the company's CEO, and George Beshara, the company's CFO. At this time, I'd like to turn the call over to Ms. Holt. Please go ahead.

Good morning, and welcome to TAN's third quarter fiscal year 2022 earnings conference call. I'll start today's call with a review of the quarter and outlook for the remainder of our fiscal year before turning the call over to George, who will review our financial results. Since joining the company as CEO in August, my confidence in our differentiated business model has only increased. We had a great third quarter, which reinforces my excitement in the direction Cons is headed and my belief in the enormous potential of our expanding retail, digital, and payment offerings. Overall, I'm proud of our impressive third quarter performance, especially in this very fluid business environment. During the third quarter, earnings per share increased 140% over the prior year to 60 cents per diluted share, driven by accelerating retail sales momentum, triple-digit year-over-year e-commerce growth, and favorable credit performance. On a year-to-date basis, total retail sales have increased 26.3% to $972.7 million, and earnings have increased to $3.34 per diluted share. Our strong financial results are a testament to the hard work and commitment of our team members and the actions we are pursuing to create sustainable value for our shareholders. The third quarter same store sales exceeded our expectations, increasing 20.6% over the prior fiscal year, and total sales were up 28.8%. On a two-year basis, same store sales continued to accelerate in the third quarter, increasing 9.7% compared to 3.2% in the second quarter and 1.8% in the first quarter. Retail growth underway demonstrates the rapid expansion of our e-commerce business, increasing demand across our major product categories, and our success attracting a wider range of customers. In fact, retail sales were across all payment options, even as we lapped the significant growth we experienced last fiscal year in non-com finance sales. We are also benefiting from the assortment and supply chain decisions we made earlier this year to maintain a high level of in-stocks to support next day delivery. At October 31st, 2021, over 80% of the items we carry were available for next day delivery, even as sales increased at a faster pace than inventory. We believe our in-stock position and next day availability was a competitive differentiator in the third quarter and enabled us to attract new customers. While global supply chain challenges are expected to continue into the new year, this year's results demonstrate that our teams are successfully managing through these issues. We believe our proactive inventory strategies will continue benefiting our business and competitive position going forward. As expected, third quarter retail growth margins were pressured by higher international freight costs that elevated cost of goods sold. Our team continues to do a great job managing this fluid environment and optimizing our domestic distribution assets. Our nimble supply chain approach has also allowed us to reduce dependency on quag poor. We are also taking actions to support our margins by diversifying our sourcing base, flexing our assortments, reducing promotions, and selectively increasing prices. While we remain focused on providing customers with compelling value, We will continue to closely monitor market conditions and margins across our categories and expect to continue to prudently pass along price increases to mitigate higher costs. Looking at our third quarter retail sales and performance in more detail, we saw double-digit sales growth across our top product categories. Within our appliance category, sales remained strong as same-store sales increased 21.9% over the prior year. Sales growth was driven by our assortment expansion, favorable in stock position, and rapid e-commerce growth. Furniture and mattress same store sales increased 18.8% over the prior year. More than any other category, we have pivoted the furniture assortment through creative sourcing actions to maintain a consistent flow of product and ensure a broad range of next day delivery options for our customers. In our mattress category, we continue to see strong growth from our reinvented assortment launched earlier this year, composed of leading national brands and our first private label brand, DreamSpot. DreamSpot continues to exceed our expectations and is our number one selling mattress brand in both units and dollars. In addition, our expanded Mattress in a Box assortment is driving our online growth in the category. The same store sales within our consumer electronics category increased 28.2% over the prior year. This success was driven primarily by higher TV unit sales as we leaned into the growth segments of premium picture quality and ultra-large screen sizes. In addition, as a heavily penetrated category online, TVs are benefiting from our rapid e-commerce growth. Lastly, Black Friday TV pricing started in October and contributed to a strong end to the third quarter. From a channel perspective, we ended the quarter with a record $19.2 million in e-commerce sales. The 294.8% year-over-year increase in e-commerce sales is a result of the investments we have been making to improve the functionality of our website and create a frictionless customer experience online while also leveraging our best-in-class next-day white-glove delivery capabilities. We believe our long-term e-commerce growth opportunity is significant, and we continue to invest heavily in our digital experience to increase customer conversion. With year-to-date e-commerce sales of $47.2 million, we believe we are on track to grow e-commerce sales to approximately $70 million this fiscal year. We are in the early innings of our digital transformation, and I believe we can significantly increase our e-commerce penetration in the coming years to be in line with other comparable omnichannel retailers. The performance of new stores is also contributing to our growth. Recently opened new stores added 8.2% to total retail sales growth for the quarter. We ended the third quarter with 157 stores and we have opened 11 locations year to date, primarily within the state of Florida. The performance of recently opened stores is encouraging, and we anticipate accelerating our pace of store openings next fiscal year. Turning to our credit segment, we enter the third quarter with favorable underlying credit trends, reflecting the successful actions we took beginning in March of 2020 to carefully manage risk throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. As a result of these prudent actions, we achieved a third quarter credit spread of 14.6%, representing the highest spread in over 10 years. As shown on slide 12 of our investor presentation, since optimizing our credit strategy, higher credit quality customers represent a greater percentage of cons in-house finance sales. This has occurred even as these in-house finance sales have increased. In addition, these newer higher credit quality vintages are outperforming older vintages. The weighted average origination credit score of sales financed has averaged 616 over the past four quarters compared to 608 for the fiscal year ended January 31, 2020. Our disciplined approach to risk has helped proactively manage our 60-plus day delinquency and re-age balances. Both indicators of portfolio health remain well below pre-COVID levels. As a percent of the portfolio, the 60-plus day past due balance was 8.8% compared to 11.5% for the same period last fiscal year. The balance of re-aged accounts as a percent of the portfolio was 18.3% compared to 28.2% for the same period last fiscal year. While we expect delinquency and charge-off trends to normalize in the coming quarter, We believe they will remain below pre-COVID levels based on our enhanced credit strategy and current economic outlook. As a result, I believe we are well positioned to target a credit spread of approximately 1,000 basis points going forward. As you can see, CONS has emerged from the COVID-19 pandemic stronger and better positioned for sustainable growth. Our confidence in our credit segment reflects the transformation we made during the pandemic to refine our credit strategy and add new lease to our partners. In addition, our expanded focus across a larger total addressable market of prime, near prime, and subprime customers is driving continued retail growth throughout all payment options. This is especially encouraging as we have lapped significant growth in cash, credit card, and third party finance sales over the prior fiscal year. In fact, cash, credit card, and third party finance sales have increased 23.9% during the third quarter after increasing 32.7% in the third quarter last fiscal year. Overall, I believe CONS is uniquely positioned to navigate the current macro environment and deliver strong retail and credit results next fiscal year. We are entering the fourth quarter with the best credit performance in our recent history, reflected by the highest credit spread in over 10 years. as well as favorable 60-plus day delinquency and re-age trends. In addition, our enhanced credit strategy, which relies more heavily on our third-party partners, allows us to capture incremental customers regardless of where they fall in the credit spectrum. To conclude my prepared remarks, we are well-positioned heading into the fourth quarter because of our stable credit segment and growing retail business. Overall retail trends remain strong, reflecting favorable consumer demand and the growth strategies we have put in place. In addition, providing flexible and affordable payment options is an important component of our value proposition. We believe this creates a unique competitive advantage that helps our customers better navigate the current inflationary period. I believe our recent results demonstrate the powerful value proposition we have created and a strong position we are in to navigate the dynamic retail and credit environment. Our impressive third quarter and year-to-date performance, robust in-stock inventory levels, and growing e-commerce capabilities are encouraging, and we are on track to deliver significant revenue growth and record earnings this fiscal year. As we remain focused on the future, I am confident we are headed in the right direction. I look forward to updating investors on our enhanced strategic growth plan and long-term financial outlook at an in-person investor day in Houston early next year. More details will be announced in the coming weeks, and I look forward to sharing our exciting strategies aimed at creating significant value for our shareholders. Finally, I want to use this opportunity to thank our team members for your steadfast commitment to Khan. Thank you for your continued support and service. Now, let me turn the call over to George to review our financial performance.

Thanks, Chandra. I'm encouraged by the positive momentum underway in our business and our strong position headed into the fourth quarter. On a consolidated basis, total revenues were $405.5 million for the third quarter, representing a 21.4% increase from the same period last fiscal year. We reported strong third quarter net income of $0.60 per diluted share, compared to net income of 25 cents per diluted share for the same period last fiscal year. Looking at our retail segment in more detail, total retail revenues for the third quarter were $334.8 million, a 28.8% increase from the same period last fiscal year. Higher retail revenue was driven by an increase in same-store sales of 20.6% and new store growth. During the third quarter, CONS credit sales increased 31%, which we achieved by capturing a greater share of wallet and a larger amount of higher credit quality customers within our core demographic, rather than by approving applicants further down the credit spectrum. Cash, credit card, and third-party finance sales grew 23.9% during the third quarter of fiscal year 2022. This increase was driven by a 64% increase in lease-to-own sales as we successfully leveraged our platform of integrated partners. We continue to believe we have opportunities to increase sales across all our financing options. Retail gross margin for the third quarter was 36.8%, a decrease of 150 basis points from the same period last fiscal year. The year-over-year decrease in retail gross margin was primarily driven by the impact of increased product costs as a result of higher freight, partially offset by an increase in sales of higher margin products. Higher retail sales helped leverage retail SG&A expense during the quarter. As a percent of retail sales, SG&A expenses were 30.2% for the third quarter compared to 32.4% for the same period last fiscal year. Retail segment operating income was $22.5 million compared to $15.2 million for the same period last fiscal year due to higher retail sales and improved operating leverage partially offset by lower retail gross margin. Turning to our credit segment, finance charges and other revenues were $70.6 million for the third quarter. The 4.9% decline from the same period last fiscal year was primarily a result of a 15.2% reduction in the average balance of the customer receivable portfolio. The credit quality of our portfolio has improved significantly due in part to the prudent de-risking actions we began implementing in March 2020. Our strong credit results continue to show that our receivable portfolio is performing well. Annual net charge-offs as a percent of the average portfolio balance worth 8% at the end of the third quarter compared to 14.7% for the same period last year. During the third quarter, the credit provision for bad debts was $26.5 million compared to $27.4 million last fiscal year. The year-over-year decline was due to an improvement in credit quality, which resulted in lower charge-offs during the quarter, partially offset by a greater increase in the allowance. Credit segment income before taxes was $1.8 million compared to a $2.7 million loss for the same period last fiscal year, primarily due to lower interest expense, a lower provision for bad debts, and improvements in our credit performance. I'm pleased to report that this is the fourth consecutive quarter of profitable credit segment income before taxes. As our portfolio begins to grow, we will continue to focus on controlling risk limiting portfolio volatility, and achieving approximately 1,000 basis points of annual credit spread while supporting our long-term growth opportunity. Consolidated SG&A expenses for the third quarter were $138.1 million. The $15.9 million increase from the prior year period was due to a higher variable operating expenses associated with sales growth, additional new stores, and an increase in advertising costs as we lapped prior year reductions due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Turning now to our balance sheet and capital position. We ended the third quarter with a strong balance sheet and capital position as we continue to benefit from significant year-over-year growth in cash and third-party finance sales and robust cash collections on our customer receivables portfolio. This has produced meaningful operating cash flow over the past seven quarters, which we have used to further reduce debt and strengthen our balance sheet. The end of the third quarter with $424.1 million in net debt compared to $615.2 million at the end of the third quarter of last year. In addition, net debt as a percent of the ending portfolio balance declined to approximately 37.7% at the end of the third quarter compared to approximately 48.2% at the end of the third quarter of last year. In November, we closed our 10th ABS transaction since re-entering the ABS market in 2015. The terms of the 2021A transaction reflect the highest advance rate of 85.75% and lowest all-in cost of funds of approximately 3.9% since we re-entered the ABS market. We believe completing this transaction, which resulted in net proceeds of $377.8 million further strengthens our liquidity position well into next fiscal year. In addition, our proven ABS platform continues to demonstrate our ability to access the capital markets. I am pleased with our success strengthening the balance sheet, de-risking the business, and executing our growth initiatives. These efforts have built underlying strength in our business and driven the strong sales momentum we have experienced so far this year. Before we open the call up to questions, I want to review our expectations for the full year and fourth quarter and provide some initial thoughts on our business as we head into next fiscal year. Starting with retail sales. Early back Friday pricing, combined with concerns related to product availability, caused an earlier start to the holiday season, which we believe pulled forward some retail sales into the third quarter. We believe our marketing and promotions were well positioned to capitalize on these trends and we continue to expect mid-teen same-store sale growth for the full year. For the current fiscal year, we expect finance charges and other revenue to be down year-over-year, primarily due to a lower balance of customer receivables. Given the ongoing issues related to the global supply chain, we now expect full-year retail gross margin to be down approximately 30 to 50 basis points, resulting in retail gross margin being down approximately 100 to 150 basis points in the fourth quarter. We continue to believe SG&A expenses will be up on a two-year basis primarily driven by new stores as we anticipate continued investments in our growth strategies to be largely offset by tighter cost controls. The fourth quarter provision is expected to be up versus the prior year period, driven primarily by portfolio growth. In addition, the provision in the fourth quarter of last fiscal year benefited from an approximately $20 million reduction in our allowance, primarily driven by improved economic conditions as well as a reduction in the balance of accounts that received the COVID-19 deferral. As we look into next year, we expect to produce positive same-store sales despite a fluid economic environment. We also anticipate accelerating our pace of new store openings in fiscal year 2023 above the 12 stores we will open this fiscal year. Retail gross margins are expected to remain under pressure next year, driven primarily by the ongoing impacts of the global supply chain. We anticipate our provision next year to increase primarily due to portfolio growth from higher sales of cons in-house financing and a smaller reduction in the economic reserve within our allowance. We plan to provide more insight into next year's expectations as well as our long-term financial and operating targets at our investor day early next year. Overall, we expect fiscal 2023 to be another strong year for cons and I'm excited by the direction we are headed. Finally, I want to share my thanks to all our team members for their continued hard work, service, and dedication. So, with this overview, Chandra and I are happy to take your questions. Operator, please open the call up to questions.