Jiayin Group Inc.

Q3 2022 Earnings Conference Call

11/23/2022

speaker
Operator
Good day, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for standing by and welcome to the Giant Group's third quarter 2022 earnings conference call. Currently, all participants are in listen-only mode. Later, we will conduct a question and answer session and instructions will follow at that time. As a reminder, we are recording today's call. If you have any objections, you may disconnect at this time. I will now turn the call over to Mr Sean Zhang from Investor Relations of Giant Group. Please proceed.
speaker
Sean Zhang
Good day, everyone. Thank you all for joining us on today's conference call to discuss Jiayin Group's financial results for the third quarter of 2022. We released the results earlier today. The press release is available on the company's website as well as from Newspaper Services. On the call with me today are Mr. Yan Dinggui, Chief Executive Officer, Mr. Fan Chunlin, Chief Financial Officer, and Ms. Xu Yifang, Chief Risk Officer. Before we continue, please note that today's discussion will contain forward-looking statements made under the safe harbor provisions of the U.S. Private Security Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements involve inherent risks and uncertainties. As such, the company's actual results may be materially different from the expectations expressed today. But the information regarding these and other risks and uncertainties is included in the company's public filings with the SEC. The company does not assume any obligation to update any forward-looking statements except as required under applicable law. Also, please know that unless otherwise stated, all figures mentioned during the conference call are in Chinese Renminbi. With that, let me now turn the call over to our CEO, Mr. Yan Dinggui. Mr. Yan will deliver his remarks in Chinese, and I will follow up with corresponding English translations. Please go ahead, Mr. Yan.
speaker
Yan Dinggui
Hello, everyone. Thank you for attending the Hello, everyone. Thank you for joining our third quarter 2022 earnings conference call. We delivered another outstanding quarter with strong financial and operational results. Our loan origination volume
speaker
Sean Zhang
grew by approximately 123.5% to RMB 14.9 billion in the third quarter, making it the second consecutive quarter with over 100% year-over-year growth. Our net revenue increased by approximately 55% year-over-year in the third quarter to reach RMB 894 million. Our margin profiles also continue to improve as we further refine our cost structure and optimize our operating efficiency, resulting in consistent margin improvements.
speaker
Yan Dinggui
This brilliant performance also highlights the company's cooperation in diversifying financial institutions, optimizing wind control strategies, strengthening technology capabilities, and accelerating global business expansion.
speaker
Sean Zhang
Our exemplary third quarter performance attests to our commitment towards strengthening our partnership network, refining our risk management strategies, strengthening our technology capabilities, and accelerating our global business expansion.
speaker
Yan Dinggui
In the face of the constantly changing macroeconomic environment, we continue to assess the needs of institutions and establish long-term cooperation mechanisms to ensure that the funding source is sustainable and the structure continues to be optimized. As of September 30, 2022, we have established cooperation and partnership relations with 46 financial institutions. In addition, the cooperation of 60 institutions is also in talks. Among them, the balance of the total financial institutions in the amount of loans issued in this quarter remains at a large level.
speaker
Sean Zhang
In the third quarter, expanding and strengthening partnerships with licensed financial institutions remain our top business priority. Under the current macroeconomic conditions, we focus on reassessing the needs of financial institutions and building long-term partnerships to safeguard our funding sources and optimize our funding structure. As of September 30, 2022, we have four partnerships with 46 financial institutions, and we are currently in discussion with another 60. Notably, national financial institutions in our partnership network still contributed to the majority of our total loan origination volume in the third quarter.
speaker
Yan Dinggui
In addition, since the beginning of the year, we have expanded the innovative cooperation model with financial institutions. with its own smart platform and automated solution, to continuously provide technical support services to self-employed businesses of cooperating institutions. Currently, three financial institutions have helped us to promote digital reform in financial management, control management, self-management, customer service, and other aspects of self-employed businesses. At the same time, we are still working with three financial institutions and working with six other institutions
speaker
Sean Zhang
In addition to strengthening partnerships, since earlier this year we began collaborating with partner financial institutions to provide them with technology-enabled services for their in-house operations. we offered them access to our intelligent platform and automated solutions under our new collaboration model for partner institutions. Currently, we have empowered three financial institutions to digitize their in-house business from fund management, risk management, intelligent marketing, customer services, to other operation processes. We are now interfacing with another three financial institutions and actively negotiating with six more institutions to bolster the development of this new collaboration model.
speaker
Yan Dinggui
In terms of borrowers, this quarter, we have expanded our online investment plan to optimize the efficiency of our customers. At the same time, we continue to focus on optimizing the structure of borrowers' customers. Based on the credit status of borrowers, risk assessment, On the Boris one,
speaker
Sean Zhang
We continue to invest in online marketing programs to streamline our borrower acquisition efforts. Meanwhile, our focus remains on optimizing the structure of our borrower base as we expand it. We are categorizing our borrowers based on their credit profiles, risk assessment, and borrowing behavior. The categorization enabled us to streamline our resource allocation towards premium borrowers and build a foundation for the future launch of more customized services and targeted borrower operation initiatives. In the third quarter, our average borrowing amount per borrowing reached RMB 10,158, increasing 58.1% year-over-year. Moreover, despite adding new borrowers in the quarter, our repeat borrowing rate still maintained at a healthy level above 60%.
speaker
Yan Dinggui
In this quarter, we successfully launched the second AI modeling platform and the private-sector anti-corruption system, further strengthening core technology capabilities, and flexible adjustment of control strategies. We also remain committed to strengthening our core technology capabilities in the quarter. We successfully
speaker
Sean Zhang
launched our Taihao AI modeling platform and Mingcha anti-fraud system as part of our ongoing efforts in proactively recalibrating risk control strategy and addressing the COVID-induced asset quality pressure. Our 61 to 90-day frequency rate remained relatively stable in the quarter. reflecting our outstanding risk control capabilities under the volatile macro environment.
speaker
Yan Dinggui
Moving on to our global expansion, we are increasing our investments in Indonesia to explore more business opportunities in the local market.
speaker
Sean Zhang
we also substantially expanded the scale of our loan origination and revenue generation in Nigeria. Going forward, we will continue to focus on improving the profitability of our Nigerian operations, developing innovative partnership models, as well as accelerating our product development and penetration in the local market.
speaker
Yan Dinggui
Finally, let's take a look at our recent efforts and achievements in social responsibility. In 2021, we joined the Shanghai Song Qilin Foundation to set up the Jiajing Welfare Foundation, which is calling on the whole society to pay attention to the psychological problems of young people and provide psychological health care for the younger generation. In the third quarter of this year, the Jiajing Foundation has organized a project called Let the Children Smile on the Tencent Welfare Platform to gather 10,000 psychological care services for young people.
speaker
Sean Zhang
Finally, I want to mention our recent efforts in the corporate social responsibility. Last year, we established the Jiajing Charity Special Fund with the Shanghai Song Qingling Foundation to raise social awareness of youth mental health and provide mental health support to the younger generation. In the third quarter, our Judging Charity Special Fund organized the Let Children Smile Charity fundraising event on Tencent Charity platform, where we helped fund 10,000 mental care service packages for the youth. Looking ahead, we are planning to invest in more charitable initiatives to better leverage our unique strength and fulfill our social responsibility.
speaker
Yan Dinggui
In addition, this quarter, the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic has caused a huge impact on small and medium-sized enterprises. Later, the government released a series of policies to meet the financial needs of small and medium-sized enterprises. Under the government's call, In addition,
speaker
Sean Zhang
The repeated COVID resurgence and the consequent control measures have had a negative impact on small business owners this quarter. As such, government agencies have unveiled a series of new regulations to help fulfill the pressing funding needs of small businesses. Following the government's call, We also continue our efforts in supporting small and micro businesses during the quarter by expanding our services for small and micro business owners who have long been underserved. By the end of September, our specialized loan program has served approximately 361.5 thousand small business owners in 31 provincial level regions across China. On a sequential basis, we have expanded the geographical coverage of this loan program while substantially boosted the number of small business owners we serve.
speaker
Yan Dinggui
Although the uncertainty of the global economy is increasing, we believe that the basic aspects of the Chinese financial technology service industry are still strong. With the performance of the past, it has proven that we have the ability to develop leading financial technology services, provide smart financial solutions, and create value for partners and borrowers. In the future, we believe that we will be as successful as ever.
speaker
Sean Zhang
In summary, our efforts and accomplishments in the quarter have put us in a solid position to maximize our opportunities in the future. Despite the increasing uncertainties in the global economy, we believe that the underlying fundamentals of the fintech sector remain strong. we have proven our capabilities to develop leading financing service offerings, intelligent financing solutions, and compelling value propositions. We are confident that we will continue to empower our partner financial institutions, serve our broader base, and generate sustainable value for our shareholders in the long term. With that, I will now turn the call over to our CFO, Mr. Fan Chunlin. Please go ahead.
speaker
Fan Chunlin
Thank you, Mr. Yan, and thank you, everyone, for joining our call today. I will now review our financial highlights for the quarter. Unless stated otherwise, all numbers quoted are in RMB. and the percentage changes refer to year-over-year comparisons. As Mr. Yang mentioned, we delivered another quarter of robust financial performance. Our loan origination volume grew by 123.5% to $14.9 billion as we expanded and strengthened our collaboration with institutional funding partners. Our net revenue was $894.3 million. up 55%, driven by a 47.7% increase in our revenue from loan facilitation services. Our revenue take rate decreased slightly in a quarter as we adapted to evolving market dynamics and regulatory changes. Other revenue more than doubled to $101.4 million, mainly driven by incremental revenues from individual investor referral services. Moving on to costs, origination and servicing expenses were $148.4 million, up 68.1%, in line with our loan origination volume growth. Allowance for receivables and accounts assets reduced moderately by 4.8% to $5.9 million. mainly as a result of the ongoing restructuring of our overseas business during the quarter. Sales and marketing expenses increased by 36.6% to $323.6 million, refreshing higher borrow acquisition expenses in the quarter as we continue to invest in our online marketing programs. G&A expenses were $51.4 million, up 13.5%, primarily driven by expenditures in compensation and related benefits in the quarter. R&D expenses were 56.4 million, up 52%. We recorded higher employee compensations and benefits, as well as increased fees for professional services in the quarter. Our ability to carefully manage our expenses refine our cost structures and improve operating efficiencies while growing our business enabled us to further enhance our profit margins in the quarter. Our net income increased significantly by 98.8% to $248.1 million from $124.8 million in the same period of last year. Our net profits margin also expanded to 27.7% from 21.6% in the same period of last year. We ended this quarter with 217.5 million in cash and cash equivalents, up from 213.9 million as of June 30, 2022. As of September 30, 2022, we have deployed approximately US dollar 2.1 million to repurchase approximately 0.9 million American depository shares under the share repurchase plan we initiated since June 13, 2022. Moving to our guidance, given our better than expected performance in the first nine months of the year, we now further revise our four-year 2022 loan initiative volume outlook to RMB $50 billion, which compares to the original RMB $36 billion we provided in the first quarter and the updated RMB $43 billion we announced last quarter. With that, we can open the call for questions. Mr. Xu, our Chief Risk Officer and I will answer questions. Operator, please go ahead.
speaker
Operator
Thank you. If you would like to ask a question, please press star 1 1 on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. Once again, if you would like to ask a question, please press star 1 1 on your telephone. Please stand by while we compile the Q&A roster.
speaker
spk01
Thank you. We'll now take our first question.
speaker
Operator
Please stand by. Your first question is from the line of Sam Lee, an investor. Please go ahead.
speaker
Sam Lee
Good evening, and thank you for taking my question. My first question is regarding the really strong growth, especially in the past few quarters. What are some of the key drivers for the growth, and how long do you expect to sustain a high double-digit growth going forward? Thank you.
speaker
spk03
Hi, Sam. This is Yifeng. I'm going to take your question. So your question is about our key drivers for strong growth. In my opinion, they were primarily coming from three fronts. The first is coming from our laser focus on strengthening and expanding our partnership with the licensed financial institutions. As Mr. Yen mentioned earlier, we have established over 46 financial institutions. With the deepened and broader network, the demand for our loans has been driven up as a result. The second are coming from our vast customer base. Since the start of the giant group, we have already served over 12 million customers in terms of their loan needs, and we continue to drive higher growth on our overall customer base. But the last but the most important is really the technological capabilities and expertise built over the years focusing on the data-driven credit strategy and operational strategies. With such capabilities that will allow us to deep into our customer base and to properly assess their lending needs and be able to driving up our overall loan growth. So your question is about how long we'll be able to keep the growth. Of course, we like to see that as long as possible. But as we all know, in terms of the absolute loan growth, we're really focusing on making sure the growth is healthy, sustainable, and forward-looking, especially relative to overall economic outlook. legislation framework as well as our market outlook. So that we try to balance both our growth and overall risk as well. So I hope that answers your question.
speaker
Operator
Thank you. And we have no more questions at this time. I'll return the call back to Sean for closing remarks. Please go ahead.
speaker
Sean Zhang
Thank you, operator. And thank you all for participating on today's call. And thank you for your support. We appreciate your interest and look forward to reporting to you again next quarter on our progress.
speaker
Operator
Thank you. This does conclude the conference for today. Thank you for participating and you may now disconnect. you Thank you.
speaker
spk00
Thank you.
speaker
Operator
Good day, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for standing by and welcome to the Giant Group's third quarter 2022 earnings conference call. Currently, all participants are in listen-only mode. Later, we will conduct a question and answer session and instructions will follow at that time. As a reminder, we are recording today's call. If you have any objections, you may disconnect at this time. I will now turn the call over to Mr. Sean Zhang from Investor Relations of Giant Group. Please proceed.
speaker
Sean Zhang
Good day, everyone. Thank you all for joining us on today's conference call to discuss Jiayin Group's financial results for the third quarter of 2022. We released the results earlier today. The press release is available on the company's website as well as from Newspaper Services. On the call with me today are Mr. Yan Dinggui, Chief Executive Officer, Mr. Fan Chunlin, Chief Financial Officer, and Ms. Xu Yifang, Chief Risk Officer. Before we continue, please note that today's discussion will contain forward-looking statements made under the safe harbor provisions of the U.S. Private Security Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements involve inherent risks and uncertainties. As such, the company's actual results may be materially different from the expectations expressed today. But the information regarding these and other risks and uncertainties is included in the company's public filings with the SEC. The company does not assume any obligation to update any forward-looking statements except as required under applicable law. Also, please note that unless otherwise stated, all figures mentioned during the conference call are in Chinese Renminbi. With that, let me now turn the call over to our CEO, Mr. Yan Dinggui. Mr. Yan will deliver his remarks in Chinese, and I will follow up with corresponding English translations. Please go ahead, Mr. Yan.
speaker
Yan Dinggui
Hello, everyone. Thank you for attending the 2022年第三季度财报业绩电话会议 Hello, everyone. Thank you for joining our third quarter 2022 earnings conference call. We delivered another outstanding quarter with strong financial and operational results. Our long origination volume
speaker
Sean Zhang
grew by approximately 123.5% to RMB 14.9 billion in the third quarter, making it the second consecutive quarter with over 100% year-over-year growth. Our net revenue increased by approximately 55% year-over-year in the third quarter to reach RMB 894 million. Our margin profiles also continue to improve as we further refine our cost structure and optimize our operating efficiency, resulting in consistent margin improvements.
speaker
Yan Dinggui
This brilliant performance also highlights the company's cooperation in diversifying financial institutions, optimizing wind control strategies, strengthening technology capabilities, and accelerating global business expansion.
speaker
Sean Zhang
Our exemplary third quarter performance attests to our commitment towards strengthening our partnership network, refining our risk management strategies, strengthening our technology capabilities, and accelerating our global business expansion.
speaker
Yan Dinggui
In the face of a constantly changing macroeconomic environment, we continue to assess the needs of institutions and establish long-term cooperation mechanisms to ensure that the funding source is stable and the structure continues to be optimized. As of September 30, 2022, we have established cooperation and partnership relations with 46 financial institutions. In addition, the cooperation of 60 institutions is also in talks. Among them, the share of the total financial institutions in the amount of loans issued in this quarter remains a large majority.
speaker
Sean Zhang
In the third quarter, expanding and strengthening partnerships with licensed financial institutions remain our top business priority. Under the current macroeconomic conditions, we focus on reassessing the needs of financial institutions and building long-term partnerships to safeguard our funding sources and optimize our funding structure. As of September 30, 2022, we have four partnerships with 46 financial institutions, and we are currently in discussion with another 60. Notably, national financial institutions in our partnership network still contributed to the majority of our total loan origination volume in the third quarter.
speaker
Yan Dinggui
In addition, since the beginning of the year, with its own smart platform and automated solution, it continues to provide technical support services for self-employed businesses of cooperating institutions. Currently, three financial institutions are helping us to promote the digital reform of financial management, control management, self-management, customer service, and other aspects of self-employed businesses. At the same time, we are still working with three financial institutions and working with six other institutions
speaker
Sean Zhang
In addition to strengthening partnerships, since earlier this year, we began collaborating with partner financial institutions to provide them with technology enabled services for their in-house operations. we offered them access to our intelligent platform and automated solutions under our new collaboration model for partner institutions. Currently, we have empowered three financial institutions to digitize their in-house business from fund management, risk management, intelligent marketing, customer services, to other operation processes. We are now interfacing with another three financial institutions and actively negotiating with six more institutions to bolster the development of this new collaboration model.
speaker
Yan Dinggui
In terms of borrowers, this quarter, we have increased the number of online deposits and enhanced the efficiency of our customers. While expanding the number of borrowers, we are also focusing on enhancing the number of borrowers. Based on the credit status of the borrowers, the risk assessment, On the Boris one,
speaker
Sean Zhang
We continue to invest in online marketing programs to streamline our borrower acquisition efforts. Meanwhile, our focus remains on optimizing the structure of our borrower base as we expand it. We are categorizing our borrowers based on their credit profiles, risk assessment, and borrowing behavior. The categorization enabled us to streamline our resource allocation towards premium borrowers and build a foundation for the future launch of more customized services and targeted borrower operation initiatives. In the third quarter, our average borrowing amount per borrower reached RMB 10,158, increasing 58.1% year-over-year. Moreover, despite adding new borrowers in the quarter, our repeat borrowing rate still maintained at a healthy level above 60%.
speaker
Yan Dinggui
In this quarter, we successfully launched the second AI demo platform and the civilian counter-terrorism system, further strengthening core technology capabilities, and flexible adjustment of control strategies. We also remain committed to strengthening our core technology capabilities in the quarter. We successfully
speaker
Sean Zhang
launched our Taihou AI modeling platform and Mingcha anti-fraud system as part of our ongoing efforts in proactively recalibrating risk control strategy and addressing the COVID-induced asset quality pressure. Our 61 to 90-day frequency rate remained relatively stable in the quarter. reflecting our outstanding risk control capabilities under the volatile macro environment.
speaker
Yan Dinggui
Next, I would like to introduce the global business expansion situation of the company. This quarter, we continue to explore the local market by increasing our investment in the Indo-Pacific region. In addition, the business of the Indonesia region has been greatly improved in terms of the size and income level. In the future, we will continue to expand our business Moving on to our global expansion, we are increasing our investments in Indonesia to explore more business opportunities in the local market.
speaker
Sean Zhang
we also substantially expanded the scale of our loan origination and revenue generation in Nigeria. Going forward, we will continue to focus on improving the profitability of our Nigerian operations, developing innovative partnership models, as well as accelerating our product development and penetration in the local market.
speaker
Yan Dinggui
Finally, let's review our recent efforts and achievements in the field of social responsibility. In 2021, we joined the Shanghai Song Qilin Foundation to set up the Jiajing Welfare Foundation, which is calling on the whole society to pay attention to the psychological problems of young people and provide psychological health care for the younger generation. In the third quarter of this year, the Jiajing Foundation, through the project of promoting the smile of children on the Tencent Welfare platform, has collected 10,000 psychological care
speaker
Sean Zhang
Finally, I want to mention our recent efforts in the corporate social responsibility. Last year, we established the Jiajing Charity Special Fund with the Shanghai Song Qingling Foundation to raise social awareness of youth mental health and provide mental health support to the younger generation. In the third quarter, our Judging Charity Special Fund organized the Let Children Smile Charity fundraising event on Tencent Charity platform, where we helped fund 10,000 mental care service packages for the youth. Looking ahead, we are planning to invest in more charitable initiatives to better leverage our unique strength and fulfill our social responsibility.
speaker
Yan Dinggui
In addition, this quarter, the outbreak of the epidemic in China has caused a huge impact on small and medium-sized enterprises. Later, the government announced a series of policies in China to meet the financial needs of small and medium-sized enterprises. Under the government's call, In addition,
speaker
Sean Zhang
The repeated COVID resurgence and the consequent control measures have had a negative impact on small business owners this quarter. As such, government agencies have unveiled a series of new regulations to help fulfill the pressing funding needs of small businesses. Following the government's call, We also continue our efforts in supporting small and micro businesses during the quarter by expanding our services for small and micro business owners who have long been underserved. By the end of September, our specialized loan program has served approximately 361.5 thousand small business owners in 31 provincial level regions across China. On a sequential basis, we have expanded the geographical coverage of this loan program while substantially boosted the number of small business owners we serve.
speaker
Yan Dinggui
Although the global economy is not necessarily increasing, we believe that the basic aspects of the Chinese financial technology service industry are still strong. With the performance of the past, it has proven that we have the ability to develop leading financial technology services, provide smart financial solutions, and create value for partners and borrowers. In the future, we believe that we will be as good as ever as the rich financial institutions.
speaker
Sean Zhang
In summary, our efforts and accomplishments in the quarter have put us in a solid position to maximize our opportunities in the future. Despite the increasing uncertainties in the global economy, we believe that the underlying fundamentals of the fintech sector remain strong. we have proven our capabilities to develop leading financing service offerings, intelligent financing solutions, and compelling value propositions. We are confident that we will continue to empower our partner financial institutions, serve our broader base, and generate sustainable value for our shareholders in the long term. With that, I will now turn the call over to our CFO, Mr. Fan Chunlin. Please go ahead.
speaker
Fan Chunlin
Thank you, Mr. Yan, and thank you, everyone, for joining our call today. I will now review our financial highlights for the quarter. Unless stated otherwise, all numbers quoted are in RMB. and the percentage changes refer to year-over-year comparisons. As Mr. Yang mentioned, we delivered another quarter of robust financial performance. Our loan origination volume grew by 123.5% to $14.9 billion as we expanded and strengthened our collaboration with institutional funding partners. Our net revenue was $894.3 million. up 55%, driven by a 47.7% increase in our revenue from loan facilitation services. Our revenue take rate decreased slightly in the quarter as we adapted to evolving market dynamics and the regulatory changes. Other revenue more than doubled to $101.4 million, mainly driven by incremental revenues from individual investor referral services. Moving on to costs, origination and servicing expenses were 148.4 million, up 68.1%, in line with our loan origination volume growth. Allowance for receivables and accounts assets reduced moderately by 4.8% to 5.9 million. mainly as a result of the ongoing restructuring of our overseas business during the quarter. Sales and marketing expenses increased by 36.6% to $323.6 million, refreshing higher borrower acquisition expenses in the quarter as we continue to invest in our online marketing programs. G&A expenses were $51.4 million, up 13.5%, primarily driven by expenditures in compensation and related benefits in the quarter. R&D expenses were 56.4 million, up 52%. We recorded higher employee compensations and benefits, as well as increased fees for professional services in the quarter. Our ability to carefully manage our expenses refine our cost structures and improve operating efficiencies while growing our business enabled us to further enhance our profit margins in the quarter. Our net income increased significantly by 98.8% to $248.1 million from $124.8 million in the same period of last year. Our net profits margin also expanded to 27.7% from 21.6% in the same period of last year. We ended this quarter with 217.5 million in cash and cash equivalents, up from 213.9 million as of June 30, 2022. As of September 30, 2022, we have deployed approximately US dollar 2.1 million to repurchase approximately 0.9 million American depository shares under the share repurchase plan we initiated since June 13, 2022. Moving to our guidance, given our better than expected performance in the first nine months of the year, we now further revise our four-year 2022 loan initiative volume outlook to RMB $50 billion, which compares to the original RMB $36 billion we provided in the first quarter and the updated RMB $43 billion we announced last quarter. With that, we can open the call for questions. Mr. Xu, our Chief Risk Officer and I will answer questions. Operator, please go ahead.
speaker
Operator
thank you if you would like to ask a question please press star 1 1 on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced once again if you would like to ask a question please press star 1 1 on your telephone please stand by while we compile the q a roster thank you we'll now take our first question please stand by Your first question is from the line of Sam Lee, an investor. Please go ahead.
speaker
Sam Lee
Good evening, and thank you for taking my question. My first question is regarding the really strong growth, especially in the past few quarters. What are some of the key drivers for the growth, and how long do you expect to sustain a high double-digit growth going forward? Thank you.
speaker
spk03
Hi, Sam. This is Yifeng. I'm going to take your question. So your question is about our key drivers for strong growth. In my opinion, they were primarily coming from three fronts. The first is coming from our laser focus on strengthening and expanding our partnership with the licensed financial institutions. As Mr. Yen mentioned earlier, we have established over 46 financial institutions. With a deepened and a broader network, the demand for our loans has been driven up as a result. The second are coming from our vast customer base. Since the start of the giant group, we have already served over 12 million customers in terms of their loan needs, and we continue to drive higher growth on our overall customer base. But the last but the most important is really the technological capabilities and expertise built over the years focusing on the data-driven credit strategy and operational strategies with such capabilities that will allow us to get into our customer base and to properly assess their lending needs and be able to drive up our overall loan growth. So your question is about how long we'll be able to keep the growth. Of course, we like to see that as long as possible. But as we all know, in terms of the absolute long growth, we're really focusing on making sure the growth is healthy, sustainable, and forward-looking, especially relative to overall economic outlook, legislation framework, as well as our market outlook. So that we try to balance both our growth and overall risk as well. So I hope that answers your question.
speaker
Operator
Thank you. And we have no more questions at this time. I'll return the call back to Sean for closing remarks. Please go ahead.
speaker
Sean Zhang
Thank you, operator, and thank you all for participating on today's call, and thank you for your support. We appreciate your interest and look forward to reporting to you again next quarter on our progress.
speaker
Operator
Thank you. This does conclude the conference for today. Thank you for participating, and you may now disconnect.
Disclaimer

This conference call transcript was computer generated and almost certianly contains errors. This transcript is provided for information purposes only.EarningsCall, LLC makes no representation about the accuracy of the aforementioned transcript, and you are cautioned not to place undue reliance on the information provided by the transcript.

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