Priority Technology Q2 2023 Earnings Report C$6.11 -0.96 (-13.58%) As of 01:05 PM Eastern Earnings HistoryForecast Bausch Health Companies EPS ResultsActual EPS-C$0.16Consensus EPS -C$0.14Beat/MissMissed by -C$0.02One Year Ago EPSN/ABausch Health Companies Revenue ResultsActual Revenue$182.29 millionExpected Revenue$189.73 millionBeat/MissMissed by -$7.44 millionYoY Revenue GrowthN/ABausch Health Companies Announcement DetailsQuarterQ2 2023Date8/10/2023TimeN/AConference Call DateThursday, August 10, 2023Conference Call Time11:00AM ETConference Call ResourcesConference Call AudioConference Call TranscriptSlide DeckPress Release (8-K)Quarterly Report (10-Q)Earnings HistoryBHC ProfileSlide DeckFull Screen Slide DeckPowered by Bausch Health Companies Q2 2023 Earnings Call TranscriptProvided by QuartrAugust 10, 2023 ShareLink copied to clipboard.There are 7 speakers on the call. Operator00:00:13After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. Please note this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Chris Kettman. Please go ahead. Speaker 100:00:30Good morning, and thank you for joining us. With me today are Tom Priore, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Priority Technology Holdings and Tim O'Leary, Chief Financial Officer. Before we give our prepared remarks, I would like to remind all participants that our comments today will include forward looking statements, which involve a number of risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to differ materially from our forward looking statements. The Company undertakes no obligation to update or revise the forward looking statements whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. We provide a detailed discussion of the various risk factors in our SEC filings, and we encourage you to review these filings. Speaker 100:01:11Additionally, we may refer to non GAAP measures, including but not limited to EBITDA and adjusted EBITDA during the call. Reconciliations of our non GAAP performance and liquidity measures to the appropriate GAAP measures can be found in our press release and To see filings available in the Investors section of our website. With that, I would like to now turn the call over to our Chairman and CEO, Tom Priore. Speaker 200:01:36Thank you, Chris, and thanks for everyone for joining us for our Q2 2023 earnings call. I'd like to start today by walking through some of the trends we're currently seeing in the business and then provide an overview of noteworthy developments at Priority, including our exciting recent acquisition of Plastiq. Speaker 300:01:56Consistent with what we saw in Speaker 200:01:58the 1st few months of the year, During the Q2, we continued to execute in SMB Acquiring and delivered strong results in both B2B and Enterprise Payments. We remain committed to our unified commerce vision combining payments and banking on a single platform Accelerated by the strength of our countercyclical business lines that we're positioned to benefit from higher interest rates and weakening macroeconomic trends. We're equally pleased that our 3rd quarter performance remains on a similar trajectory to what we have seen in the first half of the year. As you saw in our announcement earlier today, we continued our positive momentum with a strong second quarter. Our Q2 revenue organically increased 10% from the prior year to 182,300,000 This led to a 20% increase in adjusted gross profit to $67,000,000 and a 21% improvement in adjusted EBITDA to $41,100,000 Adjusted gross margin of 36.8 percent increased 330 basis points from the prior year quarter, highlighting the strong operating leverage of our purpose built platform. Speaker 200:03:13On a year to date basis, revenue has increased 15% to $367,300,000 driving a 21% gain in gross profit to 130,100,000 Combined with 180 basis point increase in adjusted gross profit margin in the first half of twenty twenty three to 35.4 percent, We achieved a 23% increase in adjusted EBITDA thus far in 2023. As you may have noted on the first page of the supplemental slides, we anticipate that our strong first half performance and established trends in our business channels will continue. As a result, we remain confident in our ability to deliver consistent double digit top line and bottom line growth, Projecting full year revenue to increase to $765,000,000 to $780,000,000 which includes plastics contribution. More significantly, we're reiterating our previous adjusted EBITDA guidance of $160,000,000 to $165,000,000 For 2023, despite the drag on EBITDA in the back half of the year from our recent acquisition of Plastic, which will require some investment to bring the division to profitability. These expected results are a testament to the value of our offering and the strength of our performance. Speaker 200:04:39For those of you who are new to Priority, Slide 6 highlights the architecture of our proprietary unified commerce platform that combines robust payments and banking functionality to monetize the merchant and partner networks we serve. Our growing customer base combined with current market conditions continue to reinforce our belief That systems combining features of both payments and banking to accelerate cash flow and distribute funds in multiparty environments Will be critical as businesses put greater demands on software and payment solution providers. We're committed to meeting our customers' growing demand by refining the experience for our partners to make working with Priority seamless And simple, partners can choose the application that best fits their business, whether that is a small business operator choosing from the MX Merchant, POS Suite, an FI or middle market customer adopting CPX or now plastic for automated payables Or an enterprise partner connecting to us via our API, they can select the Passport financial tools that best fit their needs and begin to move money. We continue to stay on the cutting edge of payment technology by innovating our SaaS payment suite of services and Passport Commerce Engine to meet the evolving needs of our customers. Speaker 200:06:05As further evidence of this, as of the Q2, we have 13 program managers fully integrated on Passport and 9 in the process of implementation With a robust prospect pipeline and have continued to execute the rollout of our MX merchant POS suite, adding 122 new customers From our direct channels during Q2 with 44 independent reselling partners who joined our MX Merchant POS distributor program, which went live in July, waiting in the wings. In addition to the continued strength of our legacy business, last week, we We've closed our acquisition of Plastiq, a highly complementary B2B payments technology platform that will quickly benefit from our operational and revenue synergies that can be captured on our unique payments infrastructure. Plastiq provides businesses with instant access to working capital solutions that improve cash flow while automating and enabling Control over all aspects of accounts payable and receivables. By adding plastic, our combined B2B offering will provide businesses, Supplier and buyer funded working capital solutions that optimize their most important vendor relationships while maximizing cash flow flexibility to operate and grow. The addition of plastic is another example of how Priority is Automated bill payment tools now including plastic that best fit their business to optimize their cash flow management all in one place on our native payments and banking as a service platform. Speaker 200:08:01We've proven our ability To create value for our shareholders and customers through strategic acquisitions in the past and we see the same Value creating opportunity with the addition of Plastics. We look forward to welcoming Plastics team into the Priority family And integrating the businesses over the next several months to realize the opportunities to grow our B2B customer base through the benefits of our combined offering And the power of our Passport Commerce engine. I'm happy to answer any questions you might have on plastic during the Q and A portion But at this point, I would like to hand it over to Tim, who will provide further insights into our segment level performance during the Q2, along with current trends in each that factored into our guidance for the full year. Speaker 300:08:51Thank you, Tom, and good morning, everyone. As I review the Q2 financial results, including the segment level contribution to the consolidated results, please refer to the supplemental slides or the MD and A for further details. Our MD and A is included in the Form 10 Q that was filed with the SEC this morning and provides a discussion of our comparative second quarter results. A link to that filing can also be found on our website. Consistent with what we saw in the Q1, Our strong financial performance in the Q2 of 2023 was driven by the diverse mix of our business segments, which Continue to demonstrate the ability of Priority to perform in a variety of market conditions. Speaker 300:09:32Before I go into the segment level results, I want to provide a few other key metrics as it relates to the Q2 consolidated results. For the quarter, bank card dollar volume across all segments was 15 $9,000,000,000 in line with Q2 of last year. If you include ACH, debit and other volumes, the total payments volume for the quarter was $30,000,000,000 which is a 5% increase from $28,600,000,000 in 2022. On a trailing 12 month basis at the end of Q2, bank card dollar volume was just over $63,000,000,000 and total payments volume was almost 117,000,000,000 If you look at the comparable trailing 12 month period for last year, those same volumes were $58,000,000,000 and just over 106,000,000,000 which represent just under 9% and just over 10% year over year growth respectively. Again, those volume metrics are for the consolidated business. Speaker 300:10:30I'll now go into more detail in each of the business segments results for the Q2. Let's start with SMB payments on Slide 9. For the Q2, SMB generated revenue of $147,900,000 which was a 4% or $5,400,000 Increased over the prior year's Q2. This growth was driven by a combination of higher merchant card fees And 10% growth in bank card transaction count to 180,300,000 transactions, which offset decline in bank card dollar volume to $15,100,000,000 Bank card dollar volume in the SMB segment was negatively impacted during the quarter by a longstanding reseller partner implementing a planned diversification of their new merchant boarding activity. While we continue to have a strong relationship with this reseller, We also expect that the diversification and boarding activity will continue through 2023. Speaker 300:11:24We anticipate though that the quarterly impact will lessen in future quarters. We averaged just over 257,000 merchants during the quarter, which is 4% higher than Q2 of 2022. For the quarter, new monthly merchant boards averaged just under 4,000 compared to an average of 4,500 per month in the Q2 of 2022. Consistent with my comments on bank card dollar volumes, merchant boarding trends were also negatively impacted during the quarter by the reseller partners' diversification activity. Continuing with SMB profitability on the next page. Speaker 300:12:00Adjusted gross profit for the quarter was down by $200,000 to $35,300,000 compared to last year. The 1% year over year decline in comparative quarterly gross profit Was negatively impacted by a non recurring $1,000,000 billing true up for certain assessments by one of our sponsor banks. If you exclude that impact, gross profit would have increased by $800,000 in the quarter. Lastly for SMB, Quarterly operating income of $11,500,000 represents a $2,500,000 decline from the prior year's Q2. Consistent with my comments on gross profit, the comparative quarterly operating profit on a year over year basis was negatively impacted by the timing of the billing true up In addition, salaries and benefits in SMB were $1,700,000 higher in Q2 compared to last year based on an increase in headcount in the second half of twenty twenty two. Speaker 300:12:55Moving to B2B payments. Revenue of $3,000,000 was a decrease of 44% from the prior year as we continue to anniversary the previously discussed wind down of the Managed Services business. We'll continue to see a year over year impact from managed services in Q3 before that comparative headwind goes away in Q4. And looking separately at the CPX business, that business grew by 11% in Q2 compared to both last year's Q2 and also sequentially versus Q1 of this year. Looking ahead to Q3, the B2B segment will include the results of plastic for the months of August and So we'll include details on that impact for you on our next quarterly earnings call. Speaker 300:13:39With respect to B2B's profitability on Slide 12, Adjusted gross profit declined to $2,300,000 as a result of the managed services wind down, but adjusted gross profit margins continue to increase as the lower margin managed services business rolls off. For the quarter, gross margins were 70 For the quarter, gross margins were 78.8% compared to 59.7% last year and 71.4% in Q1 of this year. The B2B segment was a breakeven from an operating income standpoint during the quarter, which was down from $700,000 in Q2 last year, but was an improvement from an $800,000 operating loss in Q1 of this year. Moving to the Enterprise segment on the next page. Q2 revenue of $31,400,000 Was an increase of almost $13,000,000 or 69 percent from $18,600,000 in Q2 of 2022. Speaker 300:14:34The themes from the past several quarters have continued as favorable trends in new monthly enrollments, an increase in the number of billed clients, Growth in deposit balances and the higher interest rate environment have all contributed to the strong revenue growth. As shown on the next slide, adjusted gross profit for the Enterprise segment increased by 72% to 29,300,000 while adjusted gross profit margins expanded by 200 basis points to just over 93%. Operating income of 16,100,000 The Enterprise segment also benefited from operating leverage in the business as exemplified by profit growth significantly outpacing revenue growth for the quarter. Moving on to corporate costs on Slide 15. Operating expenses totaled $47,900,000 for the quarter, an increase of 12% from the prior year. Speaker 300:15:27Salaries and benefits of $19,100,000 increased 21% from Q2 of last year, but was consistent with our spend during Q1 as we continue to maintain our expense discipline after investing in the business and the team during 2022. We finished Q2 with approximately 9.40 employees, including 346 at our India Development Center, which is compared to approximately $870,000,000 at the end of Q2 in 2022. SG and A of $10,800,000 increased 15% from $9,300,000 in Q2 2022, While depreciation and amortization of $18,000,000 for the quarter increased modestly from the comparable quarter last year and was consistent with our Q1 levels. Moving to the next slide. Adjusted EBITDA for the quarter was $41,100,000 which was an increase of 21% from $33,900,000 in Q2 of 2022. Speaker 300:16:26Interest expense of $17,800,000 for the quarter Increased $5,300,000 from Q2 2022 levels as a result of the impact of the rising interest rate environment. As mentioned on prior calls, we have a natural hedge in place for the floating rate debt given the interest income we generate on our deposits. At the end of Q2, that natural hedge covered over 115% of the debt as deposit balances grew throughout If you include the floating rate component of our preferred stock, the natural hedge at the end of Q2 covered 83% of our floating rate liabilities. While not listed on the slide for the LTM period ended June 30, adjusted EBITDA of $153,600,000 Represents over $7,000,000 of growth from $146,400,000 at the end of Q1. Moving to the outstanding debt slide on Page 17. Speaker 300:17:20Our debt levels have continued to decline and we finished the quarter with $612,700,000 of gross debt, which is down from $615,700,000 at the end of Q1. Net debt of $595,100,000 is also down by 4 point $7,000,000 compared to the balance at the end of Q1. From a liquidity standpoint, we ended the quarter with $49,500,000 of borrowing capacity Under our revolving credit facility, which includes a $15,000,000 increase to the facility as part of an amendment that we closed on June 30. In addition, we finished with $17,600,000 of unrestricted cash on the balance sheet at quarter end. Subsequent to quarter end In conjunction with the closing of the Plastiq acquisition, we increased the capacity on our revolving credit facility by an additional $10,000,000 which brought the total facility size to $65,000,000 On slide 18, the preferred stock on our balance sheet totaled $240,700,000 at June 30 and is net of $19,500,000 of unaccreted discounts and issuance costs. Speaker 300:18:25The 2nd quarter preferred dividend of 11,800,000 It's comprised of approximately $6,500,000 paid in cash and $4,500,000 of a PIK component. This is supplemented on our income statement With the accretion of discounts and issuance costs of just over $800,000 Before turning the call back over to Tom, I I wanted to address our revised revenue adjusted EBITDA guidance for the full year. Based on a combination of first half results, Our expectations for the second half of twenty twenty three and the impact of plastic, which will require some investment over the next couple of quarters to reach profitability, We continue to forecast adjusted EBITDA in the range of $160,000,000 to $165,000,000 for the full year. We are increasing our revenue guidance range to $765,000,000 to $780,000,000 With that, I'll now turn the call back over to Tom for his closing comments. Speaker 200:19:19Thank you, Tim. As we wrap up our review of the Q2, I wanted to reinforce one of the more important qualities of priority referenced in last quarter's earnings call that we believe will continue to propel us and differentiate us from others in the FinTech and payment sector. During that discussion, I described Priority as an organization that endeavors to operationalize Vision. This is to say that we make dedicated effort as an organization to embed into our people and our workflow a mentality that invests our financial And human capital consistently and cost efficiently to stay at the forefront, leading both industry and customer trends well ahead of our competitors. We would submit that there is a growing body of evidence to support our capabilities. Speaker 200:20:13Consider that as early as 2020, we position Priority to build out countercyclical business lines and focus on sectors that were early in their conversion from non digital to digital payment methods to insulate our stakeholders from the impending risk of declining growth trends and rising inflation. That vision led to strong results through the height of COVID as well as the sale of part of our real estate technology holdings in a transaction with MRI Software, who remains a key integrated partner. That monetization resulted in approximately A 120% return on capital in a little over a year and the pay down of $106,000,000 in debt. Similarly, in 2021, we had already initiated a refined strategy to add banking as a service Through the FinCera acquisition, NSENCE developed its limited roots into our high growth Passport, Collect Store and Send engine, well ahead of today's fast growing demand for embedded finance solutions. The guiding thesis driving our vision and innovation is that modern commerce demands speed and flexibility to move money that can only be achieved through a combination of payments and banking features that are harmonized on a single platform For all payment routes and the real time movement, posting and settlement of money as businesses of all sizes look to accelerate cash flow and optimize working capital, particularly in today's rising interest rate environment. Speaker 200:22:00We are confident that our acquisition of Plastics will be another example of our operationalized vision and demonstrate Why Priority is uniquely positioned to deliver the solutions businesses need. At Priority, businesses can collect their sales And accounts receivables on our merchant acquiring applications quickly fund their money to their linked Passport accounts And send it to vendors through our supplier funded CPX or buyer funded plastic payment applications. Simply put, Priority is a one stop shop for businesses to accelerate cash flow, maximize their working capital options to monetize payment flows that grow their business. We appreciate you all taking the time to participate in today's call And the ongoing support of our investors and analysts. Operator, we now open the call for questions. Operator00:23:00We will now begin the question and answer session. The first question comes from Brian Kinstlinger of Alliance Global Partners. Please go ahead. Speaker 400:23:24Hey, good morning. Thanks so much for taking my questions. You talked about this merchant acquiring was a bit weaker In the last 2 years or so and in fact, total merchant count was down sequentially for the first time in my memory. Can you go a little bit more into the detail of the impact from the resale partner? Did this partner exclusively resell Priority Payment Solutions and now is sending merchants it acquires to a variety of processors? Speaker 400:23:55I was just a little bit confused. Speaker 200:23:58Yes, sure. So Brian, it's been a yes, a long standing partner and they were exclusive with Priority And look they've reached a scale that and also diversified Some of their offering in products that look if I were managing their business And I've expressed this to them. It makes sense for them to have some diversification. So they're balancing that. Still a long standing Strong partnership, and we anticipate that there's going to be some other areas of perspective growth with them, Because of the nature of the banking and automated payable solutions we have as those start to evolve into their network. Speaker 200:24:47But Step 1 is for them to have some diversification in boarding. That's underway. It's been known, and we'll continue to build on the strong historical partnership we have. But that is the driver of some of the flattening that you see. If we were to, let's say, look at them, extract them from our analysis, I think Tim can share with you some of the stats that it actually would have increased year over year. Speaker 200:25:25So go ahead, Tim. Yes. Speaker 300:25:27I think if you extracted that reseller partner, Brian, and looked at just the volume growth, we would have had 3% volume growth in the quarter Compared to the 2% volume decline that we did show on a consolidated basis and then your average merchant count was flat, right, Because of that, right. So I think revenues without that impact would have been up 12% for SMB, right. So obviously, as we've talked about in the past, some of our larger reseller partners are they generate a lot of revenue, but the gross profit impact isn't as great. So we would have had a bigger Revenue impact without that reseller partner diversifying their boarding, but the gross profit impact would have been less, right? So Yes, I think we're confident as we mentioned in our prepared remarks that in the future quarters we'll see a little bit less of an impact from the diversification throughout the balance of the year. Speaker 400:26:23Okay. And then as it relates to plastic, How do you see that helping with the adoption and or growth trajectory of CPX? Speaker 200:26:38Well, let's just talk at the adoption of, I'll call it, automated payables generally, Is the way we think about it, right? So if you look at our commercial and B2B segment, right, those are Design those products are designed for customers to pay vendors. So for buyers of goods and services to pay their vendors to optimize their supply chain relationships and their working capital. With the addition of plastic, now those customers have the option to use CPX, where the supplier absorbs the cost of a digital payment, But also to use plastic really within CPX as a payment method To use their existing credit that has been issued by their bank To make payments to suppliers who do not accept credit card. So let me give you a mathematical example of a way to look at it. Speaker 200:27:58So let's just say I'm a Supplier paying $10,000 in bills. And it's a qualifies for I'm going to take you into the weasel a bit, Brian, on the way interchange works. But just level 2 interchange, which is typically Achievable on a B2B transaction, clears just around 2%, let's say add a modest amount of feeds For processing and you're looking at 2.25 percent of total cost to pay those $10,000 in bills. But they have a rewards card that pays them cash back. And let's just keep the math simple of 1.25 percent, let's call it 1%, okay? Speaker 200:28:50So my net cost Is 1.25 percent. The standard payment, if I use my credit card, By the time it shows up on my bill and then I get my 30 days to pay my bill, it's 56 days. Now most larger companies actually have more time than that, but let's use this 56 day standard for our mathematical example. So my net cost of the $2.25 minuteus 1% cash back is 1.25%. Well, At the current interest rate, 56 days of cash That I don't have to pay my credit card bill, let's just say even invested in FDIC insured deposits at 5.5 Slightly over 90 basis points. Speaker 200:29:50Right. So my net cost in Working capital, right, you're down around 30 plus basis points over a 2 month period. Annualize that exceedingly low. And you're talking about, under a couple percent in terms of cost of capital if you're doing that every month. So It's very attractive in this environment to utilize that credit that's already available to businesses that they may not be maximizing. Speaker 200:30:27So That's very specifically how we see this being implemented across not just the B2B segment, B2B Payment segment, CPX, But more broadly across the SMB segment of our business where we have nearly 260,000 active customers and Look, 70% of small businesses struggle with Working capital. So, we think there's a time for this Feature this product within our broader platform of Unifi Commerce To really come to the fore. And that was a big driver of why we pursued the acquisition when the asset became available to us. Speaker 400:31:20Got it. I have one last question in the queue. It's just back at The payments business, the consumer payments business. Again, if I look at the average ticket size, it's meaningfully down from, Again, the last many quarters when you could see the economy was weakening, it was not. Is earning different? Speaker 400:31:43Is it a weaker consumer? Is Pricing coming down, why would we see the average ticket size be 10% off from where it consistently has been for so many quarters? Speaker 300:31:54Yes. Hey, Brian. So I think the main impact there is some of the volume shifts and thinking about the mix. Right. So part of the volume that declined during the quarter was a much higher ticket, right. Speaker 300:32:07So different verticals tend to Operate with much higher ticket sizes, professional services and other areas and some of the volume declines we saw especially from the large reseller partner You came from some of those areas, so that mix shift impacted the average ticket size. But I think if you looked at a kind of same store sales Aspect to kind of thinking about like kind business, we really haven't seen much of a change in the average ticket size. We've seen a little bit of a benefit in certain areas from the inflation On the broader market, but what you're seeing on the average ticket size across the entire enterprise is really driven by a little bit of the mix shift. Speaker 400:32:44Okay. All right. Thanks so much. Operator00:32:55The next question is from Jacob Steffen of Lake Street. Please go ahead. Speaker 500:33:01Yes. Hey, guys. Thanks for taking my questions. So when I look at the B2B segment, do you feel that this business has kind of stabilized? Just talking about the base business here, around that $3,000,000 level, how can you see that business Expanding, is it plastic becoming more of a bigger part of the package? Speaker 500:33:24Or what are your kind of growth expectations for the base business here? Speaker 200:33:30No. We see that business growing substantially over the next year. The recognize that The decline that you're seeing was from a segment of managed services that has now fully run off as of this So the and that was largely An outsourced services component of the business that look, we really wanted to dedicate more towards The growth opportunities in B2B with our resources, which is why we made that decision. Now The existing pipeline we already have contracted, we know will create meaningful growth. So that coupled with the plastic addition as well as just Our current pipeline in process of contract negotiation Speaker 300:34:38and Speaker 200:34:41Kind of final sales processes, we see that growing A couple of 100% over the coming year. Speaker 300:34:56Jacob, just to put some on the queue. So the CPX business, right, so if you think about B2B and Separate managed services from the CPX business, right, that CPX platform grew 11% sequentially from Q1 to Q2. Right. So we are seeing growth in that product offering. We will continue to see some comparative headwinds in Q3, Right. Speaker 300:35:21So the managed services business started winding down in late Q3 of last year and was effectively gone in Q4. So You will have a relatively clean quarter, absent plastic, which obviously will help bridge that next quarter. But from a pure kind of existing B2B business, Q4 this year over last year will be clean, with managed services really starting to show a lesser impact in Q3 and effectively gone in Q4. Speaker 500:35:49Okay. And then maybe just on the plastic acquisition, what kind of operating expense kind of step up could we see From a full quarter of plastics, so not really Q3, but a full quarter would be Q4. What kind of OpEx Uptake would you kind of see from that being in the model? Speaker 300:36:14Yes. From an OpEx standpoint, I think that business is going to be running at, let's call it, $5,000,000 a quarter, right, of OpEx, which is the plastic business itself. Okay. Right. So if you think of our If you think about the overall guidance right now and kind of where we've revised, you can kind of think of the revenue change in guidance being Largely attributable to plastic and the revenue we expect to generate in the last 5 months of the year. Speaker 300:36:44And then we didn't really get into the specifics on the EBITDA, but We're comfortable keeping the EBITDA guidance where it is despite a few $1,000,000 of investment we're going to have to make in that business to get to profitability. So It's going to run at higher OpEx for a short time period as we expect all the cost savings, but expect to get that business to profitability pretty quickly. Speaker 500:37:08Okay. That's helpful. And just last one for me here. The enterprise business, nice to see that Significant margin expansion there. It seems like this is really just a pure function of scale being built and now it's all about new enrollments. Speaker 500:37:23But What kind of revenue level do you expect you'll kind of need to increase headcount there or just build out More support in that business? Speaker 200:37:38Expense increase will be marginal, And they will not be technology based. They would maybe be relationship management based or sales. We're seeing phenomenal performance out of that sector. I kind of quoted The new program managers that have already integrated and consider that we've launched this in really in February in earnest, Ready to start bringing on partners on the program management side and 13 are already live and There's 9 in the process of going live and a healthy number thereafter that are in negotiation stage. So we've the rate of adoption Speaker 500:38:40Okay. Speaker 200:38:42We don't have to add additional people To run at the rate we are right now. Speaker 500:38:50Okay. Got it. Thanks for the color. Speaker 200:38:54Look, you bring up a really good point, Don. I just want to make this remark for the benefit of everyone on the call. Look, We think the reason why Priority is a unique platform in the space is that On a single collect store and send, call it shared services platform, We can produce across SMB Acquiring, B2B Payments and the enterprise the integrated enterprise segment. So it's built in such a way that we can scale without adding people because the platform Stealth is multifunctional. We've created workflows that come into that engine With common elements across each of those channels. Speaker 200:39:53So we don't need to Have redundant stacks of technology or have folks that are Exclusively doing one aspect or another because they're so divergent from an operational perspective. That's the benefit. And we're in the early innings of Exploiting that capability. This has not been this has been built on rock. It's built to last. Speaker 500:40:34Awesome. Great to hear. Thank you. Operator00:40:42The next question is from Hal Goetz of B. Riley Securities, please go ahead. Speaker 600:40:49Some more follow-up questions on plastic. Look at it Slide 7, it says a $70,000,000 net revenue run rate and you just mentioned $5,000,000 in OpEx. I'm just trying to Make sure I understand the revenue number versus the cost guidance you cost information you gave. Is it That $70,000,000 inclusive of like interchange and network fees or pass through revenues and really what's kind of the net revenue On a run rate of that business. Speaker 300:41:23Hi, Al. I appreciate you joining. So yes, The revenue model for plastic is a little bit different than our revenue model, historically our priority, right? So if you think about what they book as revenue, right? They act effectively as the merchant of record, right? Speaker 300:41:38So you think about a buyer using their credit card and that Cash goes through plastic and then ultimately to the supplier by whatever payment modality they want, Check Wire ACH. So with plastic as the merchant of record, they're booking more of the revenue on a, I guess, what we consider kind of a gross basis. If you compare it to plastics on priorities numbers, right, so that does include interchange. And if you start to back all those numbers out, We can go through the math. I don't have that right in front of me here on a true kind of net comparable basis, but you'd have to back all that out. Speaker 300:42:13But the 20 $5,000,000 plus of guidance we've provided, right, that's on plastics revenue model, right. So that impact to us is going to be Lower if you looked at it kind of an apples to apples basis historically how we report our revenue. Speaker 600:42:31Okay. Okay. And from my experience, it was a company that Basically ran out of money because of they were trying to do an IPO through a spec, I think, and it didn't work out. What are some of the things when a company like that gets into a situation like that on the cash, they're not making investments, they're kind of cutting back. What are the things that You're going to have to add back and can you kind of talk about the magnitude of those things into 2024 2023 and 2024? Speaker 200:43:07Look, we've actually this approach actually has been very curated. If you look through the filings, actually, we went into the bankruptcy as the stalking horse bid. So We had a deep understanding of exactly what needed to be done with plastic in order to make it successful. It's been a very collaborative approach. In fact, their customers and we made a very conscientious effort To speak to customers and key relationships, so they knew that the idea of the bankruptcy was not, I'll just call it, a result Of a business actually in this extreme duress as most bankruptcies are, but rather as a method of Really giving the company an opportunity to reset with a better partner with the appropriate partner, One that had all the resources to actually help it exploit the market position that they had gained in the time they've been in business. Speaker 200:44:16So there's nothing we need to add actually from an expense standpoint. Really the effort that we're focused on is Taking what exists at Plastiq today, which is a very elegant application for businesses of all sizes To utilize their existing credit more efficiently to optimize working capital and just get it in the hands of all of our customers, both in the upmarket B2B segment, into our integrated partners and into our SMB customers. And we've been working on that alignment with the plastic team for months. Speaker 600:45:09Great. Speaker 300:45:11Thank you. Speaker 200:45:12Yes. Thank you. Thanks for the question. Operator00:45:17This concludes our question and answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to Tom Priore for closing remarks. Speaker 200:45:27Well, I'd like to thank everyone on behalf of Tim and I and of course All the dedicated employees at Priority for taking the time to learn more about the current state of our business and how we see the future of FinTech and Payments. I appreciate everyone's engagement today. I hope everyone has a great remainder of the week, And we look forward to doing this again in the coming months and sharing more of our successful results. Thanks everyone. Operator00:46:02The conference is now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may nowRead moreRemove AdsPowered by Conference Call Audio Live Call not available Earnings Conference CallBausch Health Companies Q2 202300:00 / 00:00Speed:1x1.25x1.5x2xRemove Ads Earnings DocumentsSlide DeckPress Release(8-K)Quarterly report(10-Q) Bausch Health Companies Earnings HeadlinesHow Brookfield Infrastructure, Archer-Daniels-Midland, And Robert Half Can Put Cash In Your PocketApril 10 at 8:39 AM | benzinga.comNeed Dependable Passive Income? 4 Safe Stocks Paying 4%-10% Dividends Are Tariff Discount PricedApril 10 at 7:49 AM | 247wallst.comAltucher: Turn $900 into $108,000 in just 12 months?We are entering the final Trump Bump of our lives. But the biggest returns will not be in the stock market.April 10, 2025 | Paradigm Press (Ad)Need Dependable Passive Income? 4 Safe Stocks Paying 4%-10% Dividends Are Tariff Discount PricedApril 10 at 7:49 AM | 247wallst.comArcher-Daniels-Midland (NYSE:ADM) Considers Selling Futures Brokerage In Cost-Management PushApril 10 at 3:37 AM | finance.yahoo.comIs Archer-Daniels-Midland Company (ADM) the Best Farmland and Agriculture Stock to Buy Now?April 9 at 3:25 PM | msn.comSee More Archer-Daniels-Midland Headlines Get Earnings Announcements in your inboxWant to stay updated on the latest earnings announcements and upcoming reports for companies like Bausch Health Companies? Sign up for Earnings360's daily newsletter to receive timely earnings updates on Bausch Health Companies and other key companies, straight to your email. Email Address About Bausch Health CompaniesBausch Health Companies (TSE:BHC) operates as a diversified specialty pharmaceutical and medical device company in the United States and internationally. It develops, manufactures, and markets a range of products primarily in gastroenterology, hepatology, neurology, dermatology, international pharmaceuticals, over-the-counter (OTC) products, aesthetic medical devices, and eye health. The company operates through five segments: Salix, International, Solta Medical, Diversified, and Bausch + Lomb. The Salix segment provides gastroenterology products in the United States. The International segment sells aesthetic medical devices, branded pharmaceuticals, generic pharmaceuticals, and OTC products internationally. The Solta Medical segment engages in the sale of aesthetic medical devices. The Diversified segment offers pharmaceutical products in the areas of neurology and certain other therapeutic classes; generic products; ortho dermatologic; and dentistry products in the United States. The Bausch + Lomb segment offers products in the areas of vision care, surgical, and ophthalmic pharmaceuticals products. The company was formerly known as Valeant Pharmaceuticals International, Inc. and changed its name to Bausch Health Companies Inc. in July 2018. 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There are 7 speakers on the call. Operator00:00:13After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. Please note this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Chris Kettman. Please go ahead. Speaker 100:00:30Good morning, and thank you for joining us. With me today are Tom Priore, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Priority Technology Holdings and Tim O'Leary, Chief Financial Officer. Before we give our prepared remarks, I would like to remind all participants that our comments today will include forward looking statements, which involve a number of risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to differ materially from our forward looking statements. The Company undertakes no obligation to update or revise the forward looking statements whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. We provide a detailed discussion of the various risk factors in our SEC filings, and we encourage you to review these filings. Speaker 100:01:11Additionally, we may refer to non GAAP measures, including but not limited to EBITDA and adjusted EBITDA during the call. Reconciliations of our non GAAP performance and liquidity measures to the appropriate GAAP measures can be found in our press release and To see filings available in the Investors section of our website. With that, I would like to now turn the call over to our Chairman and CEO, Tom Priore. Speaker 200:01:36Thank you, Chris, and thanks for everyone for joining us for our Q2 2023 earnings call. I'd like to start today by walking through some of the trends we're currently seeing in the business and then provide an overview of noteworthy developments at Priority, including our exciting recent acquisition of Plastiq. Speaker 300:01:56Consistent with what we saw in Speaker 200:01:58the 1st few months of the year, During the Q2, we continued to execute in SMB Acquiring and delivered strong results in both B2B and Enterprise Payments. We remain committed to our unified commerce vision combining payments and banking on a single platform Accelerated by the strength of our countercyclical business lines that we're positioned to benefit from higher interest rates and weakening macroeconomic trends. We're equally pleased that our 3rd quarter performance remains on a similar trajectory to what we have seen in the first half of the year. As you saw in our announcement earlier today, we continued our positive momentum with a strong second quarter. Our Q2 revenue organically increased 10% from the prior year to 182,300,000 This led to a 20% increase in adjusted gross profit to $67,000,000 and a 21% improvement in adjusted EBITDA to $41,100,000 Adjusted gross margin of 36.8 percent increased 330 basis points from the prior year quarter, highlighting the strong operating leverage of our purpose built platform. Speaker 200:03:13On a year to date basis, revenue has increased 15% to $367,300,000 driving a 21% gain in gross profit to 130,100,000 Combined with 180 basis point increase in adjusted gross profit margin in the first half of twenty twenty three to 35.4 percent, We achieved a 23% increase in adjusted EBITDA thus far in 2023. As you may have noted on the first page of the supplemental slides, we anticipate that our strong first half performance and established trends in our business channels will continue. As a result, we remain confident in our ability to deliver consistent double digit top line and bottom line growth, Projecting full year revenue to increase to $765,000,000 to $780,000,000 which includes plastics contribution. More significantly, we're reiterating our previous adjusted EBITDA guidance of $160,000,000 to $165,000,000 For 2023, despite the drag on EBITDA in the back half of the year from our recent acquisition of Plastic, which will require some investment to bring the division to profitability. These expected results are a testament to the value of our offering and the strength of our performance. Speaker 200:04:39For those of you who are new to Priority, Slide 6 highlights the architecture of our proprietary unified commerce platform that combines robust payments and banking functionality to monetize the merchant and partner networks we serve. Our growing customer base combined with current market conditions continue to reinforce our belief That systems combining features of both payments and banking to accelerate cash flow and distribute funds in multiparty environments Will be critical as businesses put greater demands on software and payment solution providers. We're committed to meeting our customers' growing demand by refining the experience for our partners to make working with Priority seamless And simple, partners can choose the application that best fits their business, whether that is a small business operator choosing from the MX Merchant, POS Suite, an FI or middle market customer adopting CPX or now plastic for automated payables Or an enterprise partner connecting to us via our API, they can select the Passport financial tools that best fit their needs and begin to move money. We continue to stay on the cutting edge of payment technology by innovating our SaaS payment suite of services and Passport Commerce Engine to meet the evolving needs of our customers. Speaker 200:06:05As further evidence of this, as of the Q2, we have 13 program managers fully integrated on Passport and 9 in the process of implementation With a robust prospect pipeline and have continued to execute the rollout of our MX merchant POS suite, adding 122 new customers From our direct channels during Q2 with 44 independent reselling partners who joined our MX Merchant POS distributor program, which went live in July, waiting in the wings. In addition to the continued strength of our legacy business, last week, we We've closed our acquisition of Plastiq, a highly complementary B2B payments technology platform that will quickly benefit from our operational and revenue synergies that can be captured on our unique payments infrastructure. Plastiq provides businesses with instant access to working capital solutions that improve cash flow while automating and enabling Control over all aspects of accounts payable and receivables. By adding plastic, our combined B2B offering will provide businesses, Supplier and buyer funded working capital solutions that optimize their most important vendor relationships while maximizing cash flow flexibility to operate and grow. The addition of plastic is another example of how Priority is Automated bill payment tools now including plastic that best fit their business to optimize their cash flow management all in one place on our native payments and banking as a service platform. Speaker 200:08:01We've proven our ability To create value for our shareholders and customers through strategic acquisitions in the past and we see the same Value creating opportunity with the addition of Plastics. We look forward to welcoming Plastics team into the Priority family And integrating the businesses over the next several months to realize the opportunities to grow our B2B customer base through the benefits of our combined offering And the power of our Passport Commerce engine. I'm happy to answer any questions you might have on plastic during the Q and A portion But at this point, I would like to hand it over to Tim, who will provide further insights into our segment level performance during the Q2, along with current trends in each that factored into our guidance for the full year. Speaker 300:08:51Thank you, Tom, and good morning, everyone. As I review the Q2 financial results, including the segment level contribution to the consolidated results, please refer to the supplemental slides or the MD and A for further details. Our MD and A is included in the Form 10 Q that was filed with the SEC this morning and provides a discussion of our comparative second quarter results. A link to that filing can also be found on our website. Consistent with what we saw in the Q1, Our strong financial performance in the Q2 of 2023 was driven by the diverse mix of our business segments, which Continue to demonstrate the ability of Priority to perform in a variety of market conditions. Speaker 300:09:32Before I go into the segment level results, I want to provide a few other key metrics as it relates to the Q2 consolidated results. For the quarter, bank card dollar volume across all segments was 15 $9,000,000,000 in line with Q2 of last year. If you include ACH, debit and other volumes, the total payments volume for the quarter was $30,000,000,000 which is a 5% increase from $28,600,000,000 in 2022. On a trailing 12 month basis at the end of Q2, bank card dollar volume was just over $63,000,000,000 and total payments volume was almost 117,000,000,000 If you look at the comparable trailing 12 month period for last year, those same volumes were $58,000,000,000 and just over 106,000,000,000 which represent just under 9% and just over 10% year over year growth respectively. Again, those volume metrics are for the consolidated business. Speaker 300:10:30I'll now go into more detail in each of the business segments results for the Q2. Let's start with SMB payments on Slide 9. For the Q2, SMB generated revenue of $147,900,000 which was a 4% or $5,400,000 Increased over the prior year's Q2. This growth was driven by a combination of higher merchant card fees And 10% growth in bank card transaction count to 180,300,000 transactions, which offset decline in bank card dollar volume to $15,100,000,000 Bank card dollar volume in the SMB segment was negatively impacted during the quarter by a longstanding reseller partner implementing a planned diversification of their new merchant boarding activity. While we continue to have a strong relationship with this reseller, We also expect that the diversification and boarding activity will continue through 2023. Speaker 300:11:24We anticipate though that the quarterly impact will lessen in future quarters. We averaged just over 257,000 merchants during the quarter, which is 4% higher than Q2 of 2022. For the quarter, new monthly merchant boards averaged just under 4,000 compared to an average of 4,500 per month in the Q2 of 2022. Consistent with my comments on bank card dollar volumes, merchant boarding trends were also negatively impacted during the quarter by the reseller partners' diversification activity. Continuing with SMB profitability on the next page. Speaker 300:12:00Adjusted gross profit for the quarter was down by $200,000 to $35,300,000 compared to last year. The 1% year over year decline in comparative quarterly gross profit Was negatively impacted by a non recurring $1,000,000 billing true up for certain assessments by one of our sponsor banks. If you exclude that impact, gross profit would have increased by $800,000 in the quarter. Lastly for SMB, Quarterly operating income of $11,500,000 represents a $2,500,000 decline from the prior year's Q2. Consistent with my comments on gross profit, the comparative quarterly operating profit on a year over year basis was negatively impacted by the timing of the billing true up In addition, salaries and benefits in SMB were $1,700,000 higher in Q2 compared to last year based on an increase in headcount in the second half of twenty twenty two. Speaker 300:12:55Moving to B2B payments. Revenue of $3,000,000 was a decrease of 44% from the prior year as we continue to anniversary the previously discussed wind down of the Managed Services business. We'll continue to see a year over year impact from managed services in Q3 before that comparative headwind goes away in Q4. And looking separately at the CPX business, that business grew by 11% in Q2 compared to both last year's Q2 and also sequentially versus Q1 of this year. Looking ahead to Q3, the B2B segment will include the results of plastic for the months of August and So we'll include details on that impact for you on our next quarterly earnings call. Speaker 300:13:39With respect to B2B's profitability on Slide 12, Adjusted gross profit declined to $2,300,000 as a result of the managed services wind down, but adjusted gross profit margins continue to increase as the lower margin managed services business rolls off. For the quarter, gross margins were 70 For the quarter, gross margins were 78.8% compared to 59.7% last year and 71.4% in Q1 of this year. The B2B segment was a breakeven from an operating income standpoint during the quarter, which was down from $700,000 in Q2 last year, but was an improvement from an $800,000 operating loss in Q1 of this year. Moving to the Enterprise segment on the next page. Q2 revenue of $31,400,000 Was an increase of almost $13,000,000 or 69 percent from $18,600,000 in Q2 of 2022. Speaker 300:14:34The themes from the past several quarters have continued as favorable trends in new monthly enrollments, an increase in the number of billed clients, Growth in deposit balances and the higher interest rate environment have all contributed to the strong revenue growth. As shown on the next slide, adjusted gross profit for the Enterprise segment increased by 72% to 29,300,000 while adjusted gross profit margins expanded by 200 basis points to just over 93%. Operating income of 16,100,000 The Enterprise segment also benefited from operating leverage in the business as exemplified by profit growth significantly outpacing revenue growth for the quarter. Moving on to corporate costs on Slide 15. Operating expenses totaled $47,900,000 for the quarter, an increase of 12% from the prior year. Speaker 300:15:27Salaries and benefits of $19,100,000 increased 21% from Q2 of last year, but was consistent with our spend during Q1 as we continue to maintain our expense discipline after investing in the business and the team during 2022. We finished Q2 with approximately 9.40 employees, including 346 at our India Development Center, which is compared to approximately $870,000,000 at the end of Q2 in 2022. SG and A of $10,800,000 increased 15% from $9,300,000 in Q2 2022, While depreciation and amortization of $18,000,000 for the quarter increased modestly from the comparable quarter last year and was consistent with our Q1 levels. Moving to the next slide. Adjusted EBITDA for the quarter was $41,100,000 which was an increase of 21% from $33,900,000 in Q2 of 2022. Speaker 300:16:26Interest expense of $17,800,000 for the quarter Increased $5,300,000 from Q2 2022 levels as a result of the impact of the rising interest rate environment. As mentioned on prior calls, we have a natural hedge in place for the floating rate debt given the interest income we generate on our deposits. At the end of Q2, that natural hedge covered over 115% of the debt as deposit balances grew throughout If you include the floating rate component of our preferred stock, the natural hedge at the end of Q2 covered 83% of our floating rate liabilities. While not listed on the slide for the LTM period ended June 30, adjusted EBITDA of $153,600,000 Represents over $7,000,000 of growth from $146,400,000 at the end of Q1. Moving to the outstanding debt slide on Page 17. Speaker 300:17:20Our debt levels have continued to decline and we finished the quarter with $612,700,000 of gross debt, which is down from $615,700,000 at the end of Q1. Net debt of $595,100,000 is also down by 4 point $7,000,000 compared to the balance at the end of Q1. From a liquidity standpoint, we ended the quarter with $49,500,000 of borrowing capacity Under our revolving credit facility, which includes a $15,000,000 increase to the facility as part of an amendment that we closed on June 30. In addition, we finished with $17,600,000 of unrestricted cash on the balance sheet at quarter end. Subsequent to quarter end In conjunction with the closing of the Plastiq acquisition, we increased the capacity on our revolving credit facility by an additional $10,000,000 which brought the total facility size to $65,000,000 On slide 18, the preferred stock on our balance sheet totaled $240,700,000 at June 30 and is net of $19,500,000 of unaccreted discounts and issuance costs. Speaker 300:18:25The 2nd quarter preferred dividend of 11,800,000 It's comprised of approximately $6,500,000 paid in cash and $4,500,000 of a PIK component. This is supplemented on our income statement With the accretion of discounts and issuance costs of just over $800,000 Before turning the call back over to Tom, I I wanted to address our revised revenue adjusted EBITDA guidance for the full year. Based on a combination of first half results, Our expectations for the second half of twenty twenty three and the impact of plastic, which will require some investment over the next couple of quarters to reach profitability, We continue to forecast adjusted EBITDA in the range of $160,000,000 to $165,000,000 for the full year. We are increasing our revenue guidance range to $765,000,000 to $780,000,000 With that, I'll now turn the call back over to Tom for his closing comments. Speaker 200:19:19Thank you, Tim. As we wrap up our review of the Q2, I wanted to reinforce one of the more important qualities of priority referenced in last quarter's earnings call that we believe will continue to propel us and differentiate us from others in the FinTech and payment sector. During that discussion, I described Priority as an organization that endeavors to operationalize Vision. This is to say that we make dedicated effort as an organization to embed into our people and our workflow a mentality that invests our financial And human capital consistently and cost efficiently to stay at the forefront, leading both industry and customer trends well ahead of our competitors. We would submit that there is a growing body of evidence to support our capabilities. Speaker 200:20:13Consider that as early as 2020, we position Priority to build out countercyclical business lines and focus on sectors that were early in their conversion from non digital to digital payment methods to insulate our stakeholders from the impending risk of declining growth trends and rising inflation. That vision led to strong results through the height of COVID as well as the sale of part of our real estate technology holdings in a transaction with MRI Software, who remains a key integrated partner. That monetization resulted in approximately A 120% return on capital in a little over a year and the pay down of $106,000,000 in debt. Similarly, in 2021, we had already initiated a refined strategy to add banking as a service Through the FinCera acquisition, NSENCE developed its limited roots into our high growth Passport, Collect Store and Send engine, well ahead of today's fast growing demand for embedded finance solutions. The guiding thesis driving our vision and innovation is that modern commerce demands speed and flexibility to move money that can only be achieved through a combination of payments and banking features that are harmonized on a single platform For all payment routes and the real time movement, posting and settlement of money as businesses of all sizes look to accelerate cash flow and optimize working capital, particularly in today's rising interest rate environment. Speaker 200:22:00We are confident that our acquisition of Plastics will be another example of our operationalized vision and demonstrate Why Priority is uniquely positioned to deliver the solutions businesses need. At Priority, businesses can collect their sales And accounts receivables on our merchant acquiring applications quickly fund their money to their linked Passport accounts And send it to vendors through our supplier funded CPX or buyer funded plastic payment applications. Simply put, Priority is a one stop shop for businesses to accelerate cash flow, maximize their working capital options to monetize payment flows that grow their business. We appreciate you all taking the time to participate in today's call And the ongoing support of our investors and analysts. Operator, we now open the call for questions. Operator00:23:00We will now begin the question and answer session. The first question comes from Brian Kinstlinger of Alliance Global Partners. Please go ahead. Speaker 400:23:24Hey, good morning. Thanks so much for taking my questions. You talked about this merchant acquiring was a bit weaker In the last 2 years or so and in fact, total merchant count was down sequentially for the first time in my memory. Can you go a little bit more into the detail of the impact from the resale partner? Did this partner exclusively resell Priority Payment Solutions and now is sending merchants it acquires to a variety of processors? Speaker 400:23:55I was just a little bit confused. Speaker 200:23:58Yes, sure. So Brian, it's been a yes, a long standing partner and they were exclusive with Priority And look they've reached a scale that and also diversified Some of their offering in products that look if I were managing their business And I've expressed this to them. It makes sense for them to have some diversification. So they're balancing that. Still a long standing Strong partnership, and we anticipate that there's going to be some other areas of perspective growth with them, Because of the nature of the banking and automated payable solutions we have as those start to evolve into their network. Speaker 200:24:47But Step 1 is for them to have some diversification in boarding. That's underway. It's been known, and we'll continue to build on the strong historical partnership we have. But that is the driver of some of the flattening that you see. If we were to, let's say, look at them, extract them from our analysis, I think Tim can share with you some of the stats that it actually would have increased year over year. Speaker 200:25:25So go ahead, Tim. Yes. Speaker 300:25:27I think if you extracted that reseller partner, Brian, and looked at just the volume growth, we would have had 3% volume growth in the quarter Compared to the 2% volume decline that we did show on a consolidated basis and then your average merchant count was flat, right, Because of that, right. So I think revenues without that impact would have been up 12% for SMB, right. So obviously, as we've talked about in the past, some of our larger reseller partners are they generate a lot of revenue, but the gross profit impact isn't as great. So we would have had a bigger Revenue impact without that reseller partner diversifying their boarding, but the gross profit impact would have been less, right? So Yes, I think we're confident as we mentioned in our prepared remarks that in the future quarters we'll see a little bit less of an impact from the diversification throughout the balance of the year. Speaker 400:26:23Okay. And then as it relates to plastic, How do you see that helping with the adoption and or growth trajectory of CPX? Speaker 200:26:38Well, let's just talk at the adoption of, I'll call it, automated payables generally, Is the way we think about it, right? So if you look at our commercial and B2B segment, right, those are Design those products are designed for customers to pay vendors. So for buyers of goods and services to pay their vendors to optimize their supply chain relationships and their working capital. With the addition of plastic, now those customers have the option to use CPX, where the supplier absorbs the cost of a digital payment, But also to use plastic really within CPX as a payment method To use their existing credit that has been issued by their bank To make payments to suppliers who do not accept credit card. So let me give you a mathematical example of a way to look at it. Speaker 200:27:58So let's just say I'm a Supplier paying $10,000 in bills. And it's a qualifies for I'm going to take you into the weasel a bit, Brian, on the way interchange works. But just level 2 interchange, which is typically Achievable on a B2B transaction, clears just around 2%, let's say add a modest amount of feeds For processing and you're looking at 2.25 percent of total cost to pay those $10,000 in bills. But they have a rewards card that pays them cash back. And let's just keep the math simple of 1.25 percent, let's call it 1%, okay? Speaker 200:28:50So my net cost Is 1.25 percent. The standard payment, if I use my credit card, By the time it shows up on my bill and then I get my 30 days to pay my bill, it's 56 days. Now most larger companies actually have more time than that, but let's use this 56 day standard for our mathematical example. So my net cost of the $2.25 minuteus 1% cash back is 1.25%. Well, At the current interest rate, 56 days of cash That I don't have to pay my credit card bill, let's just say even invested in FDIC insured deposits at 5.5 Slightly over 90 basis points. Speaker 200:29:50Right. So my net cost in Working capital, right, you're down around 30 plus basis points over a 2 month period. Annualize that exceedingly low. And you're talking about, under a couple percent in terms of cost of capital if you're doing that every month. So It's very attractive in this environment to utilize that credit that's already available to businesses that they may not be maximizing. Speaker 200:30:27So That's very specifically how we see this being implemented across not just the B2B segment, B2B Payment segment, CPX, But more broadly across the SMB segment of our business where we have nearly 260,000 active customers and Look, 70% of small businesses struggle with Working capital. So, we think there's a time for this Feature this product within our broader platform of Unifi Commerce To really come to the fore. And that was a big driver of why we pursued the acquisition when the asset became available to us. Speaker 400:31:20Got it. I have one last question in the queue. It's just back at The payments business, the consumer payments business. Again, if I look at the average ticket size, it's meaningfully down from, Again, the last many quarters when you could see the economy was weakening, it was not. Is earning different? Speaker 400:31:43Is it a weaker consumer? Is Pricing coming down, why would we see the average ticket size be 10% off from where it consistently has been for so many quarters? Speaker 300:31:54Yes. Hey, Brian. So I think the main impact there is some of the volume shifts and thinking about the mix. Right. So part of the volume that declined during the quarter was a much higher ticket, right. Speaker 300:32:07So different verticals tend to Operate with much higher ticket sizes, professional services and other areas and some of the volume declines we saw especially from the large reseller partner You came from some of those areas, so that mix shift impacted the average ticket size. But I think if you looked at a kind of same store sales Aspect to kind of thinking about like kind business, we really haven't seen much of a change in the average ticket size. We've seen a little bit of a benefit in certain areas from the inflation On the broader market, but what you're seeing on the average ticket size across the entire enterprise is really driven by a little bit of the mix shift. Speaker 400:32:44Okay. All right. Thanks so much. Operator00:32:55The next question is from Jacob Steffen of Lake Street. Please go ahead. Speaker 500:33:01Yes. Hey, guys. Thanks for taking my questions. So when I look at the B2B segment, do you feel that this business has kind of stabilized? Just talking about the base business here, around that $3,000,000 level, how can you see that business Expanding, is it plastic becoming more of a bigger part of the package? Speaker 500:33:24Or what are your kind of growth expectations for the base business here? Speaker 200:33:30No. We see that business growing substantially over the next year. The recognize that The decline that you're seeing was from a segment of managed services that has now fully run off as of this So the and that was largely An outsourced services component of the business that look, we really wanted to dedicate more towards The growth opportunities in B2B with our resources, which is why we made that decision. Now The existing pipeline we already have contracted, we know will create meaningful growth. So that coupled with the plastic addition as well as just Our current pipeline in process of contract negotiation Speaker 300:34:38and Speaker 200:34:41Kind of final sales processes, we see that growing A couple of 100% over the coming year. Speaker 300:34:56Jacob, just to put some on the queue. So the CPX business, right, so if you think about B2B and Separate managed services from the CPX business, right, that CPX platform grew 11% sequentially from Q1 to Q2. Right. So we are seeing growth in that product offering. We will continue to see some comparative headwinds in Q3, Right. Speaker 300:35:21So the managed services business started winding down in late Q3 of last year and was effectively gone in Q4. So You will have a relatively clean quarter, absent plastic, which obviously will help bridge that next quarter. But from a pure kind of existing B2B business, Q4 this year over last year will be clean, with managed services really starting to show a lesser impact in Q3 and effectively gone in Q4. Speaker 500:35:49Okay. And then maybe just on the plastic acquisition, what kind of operating expense kind of step up could we see From a full quarter of plastics, so not really Q3, but a full quarter would be Q4. What kind of OpEx Uptake would you kind of see from that being in the model? Speaker 300:36:14Yes. From an OpEx standpoint, I think that business is going to be running at, let's call it, $5,000,000 a quarter, right, of OpEx, which is the plastic business itself. Okay. Right. So if you think of our If you think about the overall guidance right now and kind of where we've revised, you can kind of think of the revenue change in guidance being Largely attributable to plastic and the revenue we expect to generate in the last 5 months of the year. Speaker 300:36:44And then we didn't really get into the specifics on the EBITDA, but We're comfortable keeping the EBITDA guidance where it is despite a few $1,000,000 of investment we're going to have to make in that business to get to profitability. So It's going to run at higher OpEx for a short time period as we expect all the cost savings, but expect to get that business to profitability pretty quickly. Speaker 500:37:08Okay. That's helpful. And just last one for me here. The enterprise business, nice to see that Significant margin expansion there. It seems like this is really just a pure function of scale being built and now it's all about new enrollments. Speaker 500:37:23But What kind of revenue level do you expect you'll kind of need to increase headcount there or just build out More support in that business? Speaker 200:37:38Expense increase will be marginal, And they will not be technology based. They would maybe be relationship management based or sales. We're seeing phenomenal performance out of that sector. I kind of quoted The new program managers that have already integrated and consider that we've launched this in really in February in earnest, Ready to start bringing on partners on the program management side and 13 are already live and There's 9 in the process of going live and a healthy number thereafter that are in negotiation stage. So we've the rate of adoption Speaker 500:38:40Okay. Speaker 200:38:42We don't have to add additional people To run at the rate we are right now. Speaker 500:38:50Okay. Got it. Thanks for the color. Speaker 200:38:54Look, you bring up a really good point, Don. I just want to make this remark for the benefit of everyone on the call. Look, We think the reason why Priority is a unique platform in the space is that On a single collect store and send, call it shared services platform, We can produce across SMB Acquiring, B2B Payments and the enterprise the integrated enterprise segment. So it's built in such a way that we can scale without adding people because the platform Stealth is multifunctional. We've created workflows that come into that engine With common elements across each of those channels. Speaker 200:39:53So we don't need to Have redundant stacks of technology or have folks that are Exclusively doing one aspect or another because they're so divergent from an operational perspective. That's the benefit. And we're in the early innings of Exploiting that capability. This has not been this has been built on rock. It's built to last. Speaker 500:40:34Awesome. Great to hear. Thank you. Operator00:40:42The next question is from Hal Goetz of B. Riley Securities, please go ahead. Speaker 600:40:49Some more follow-up questions on plastic. Look at it Slide 7, it says a $70,000,000 net revenue run rate and you just mentioned $5,000,000 in OpEx. I'm just trying to Make sure I understand the revenue number versus the cost guidance you cost information you gave. Is it That $70,000,000 inclusive of like interchange and network fees or pass through revenues and really what's kind of the net revenue On a run rate of that business. Speaker 300:41:23Hi, Al. I appreciate you joining. So yes, The revenue model for plastic is a little bit different than our revenue model, historically our priority, right? So if you think about what they book as revenue, right? They act effectively as the merchant of record, right? Speaker 300:41:38So you think about a buyer using their credit card and that Cash goes through plastic and then ultimately to the supplier by whatever payment modality they want, Check Wire ACH. So with plastic as the merchant of record, they're booking more of the revenue on a, I guess, what we consider kind of a gross basis. If you compare it to plastics on priorities numbers, right, so that does include interchange. And if you start to back all those numbers out, We can go through the math. I don't have that right in front of me here on a true kind of net comparable basis, but you'd have to back all that out. Speaker 300:42:13But the 20 $5,000,000 plus of guidance we've provided, right, that's on plastics revenue model, right. So that impact to us is going to be Lower if you looked at it kind of an apples to apples basis historically how we report our revenue. Speaker 600:42:31Okay. Okay. And from my experience, it was a company that Basically ran out of money because of they were trying to do an IPO through a spec, I think, and it didn't work out. What are some of the things when a company like that gets into a situation like that on the cash, they're not making investments, they're kind of cutting back. What are the things that You're going to have to add back and can you kind of talk about the magnitude of those things into 2024 2023 and 2024? Speaker 200:43:07Look, we've actually this approach actually has been very curated. If you look through the filings, actually, we went into the bankruptcy as the stalking horse bid. So We had a deep understanding of exactly what needed to be done with plastic in order to make it successful. It's been a very collaborative approach. In fact, their customers and we made a very conscientious effort To speak to customers and key relationships, so they knew that the idea of the bankruptcy was not, I'll just call it, a result Of a business actually in this extreme duress as most bankruptcies are, but rather as a method of Really giving the company an opportunity to reset with a better partner with the appropriate partner, One that had all the resources to actually help it exploit the market position that they had gained in the time they've been in business. Speaker 200:44:16So there's nothing we need to add actually from an expense standpoint. Really the effort that we're focused on is Taking what exists at Plastiq today, which is a very elegant application for businesses of all sizes To utilize their existing credit more efficiently to optimize working capital and just get it in the hands of all of our customers, both in the upmarket B2B segment, into our integrated partners and into our SMB customers. And we've been working on that alignment with the plastic team for months. Speaker 600:45:09Great. Speaker 300:45:11Thank you. Speaker 200:45:12Yes. Thank you. Thanks for the question. Operator00:45:17This concludes our question and answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to Tom Priore for closing remarks. Speaker 200:45:27Well, I'd like to thank everyone on behalf of Tim and I and of course All the dedicated employees at Priority for taking the time to learn more about the current state of our business and how we see the future of FinTech and Payments. I appreciate everyone's engagement today. I hope everyone has a great remainder of the week, And we look forward to doing this again in the coming months and sharing more of our successful results. Thanks everyone. Operator00:46:02The conference is now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may nowRead moreRemove AdsPowered by