Jared Isaacman
Analyst · Darrin Peller with Wolfe Research
Thank you, Sloan, and good morning and thank you all for joining us today. For our agenda this morning, we will take you through the business performance, payment and merchant trends and strategic initiatives and we're going to save a bit of time for the fun stuff at the end, which is the road ahead. To begin and as I mentioned, some of these points in my shareholder letter, we just concluded a very challenging year. The economic, social and political issues did not spare anyone. Despite these extraordinary circumstances and having exposure to highly impacted verticals like restaurants and hotels, the team is shaped for performed incredibly well. And I'd like to highlight some of our 2020 accomplishments. So for the year, we grew every material KPI, including number of merchants using our platform, the volume they processed and the revenue generated. This marks our 21st consecutive year of year-over-year revenue growth. But mostly it reinforces the shift towards value proposition is compelling and it's winning share during the best and during the most challenging of economic circumstances. We also completed multiple capital market transactions to strengthen our balance sheet, diversify our base of shareholders and provide capital to fund organic and inorganic growth initiatives. We also completed two great acquisitions including the 3dcart eCommerce platform, which we now call Shift4Shop, which has greatly expanded our eCommerce capabilities and significantly expanded our TAM. We also released several products like our new generation online ordering products, mobile payments for takeout, delivery and curbside ordering and QR code based ordering and payments, all of which were quite timely, given the pandemic and we think we'll continue to feel growth in a post-pandemic environment. We owe our 2020 performance not just to these reasons, but also the dedication of our employees, the support of our software partners and the perseverance of our customers. It's during these challenging times that they make me most proud. As to the fourth quarter specifically, we delivered another reasonably strong quarter given the circumstances. As previously shared, we celebrated the highest volume month at the time in October, which slowed in November and then significantly so in December. We attribute this entirely to COVID requirements on social distancing and cold weather that was not conducive to travel and outdoor dining. Despite these realities, Q4 end-to-end payment volume grew 12% from the previous year to $6.8 billion. Our ability to grow merchant account and volume, while serving some of the hardest hit industries is a testament to our technology, our business model, most importantly, our people. So make no mistake, this is a quarter that included some really rough business conditions. While volume growth is nice to see during a tough quarter, we also look at active end-to-end merchant account, which grew 4% quarter-over-quarter. This continued growth in our merchant base makes us incredibly optimistic as we look forward into 2021. This end-to-end volume growth drove 5% growth in gross revenue less network fees, which resulted in adjusted EBITDA of $26.7 million for the quarter, which is up 10% from the prior year when normalized for a change in accounting for leased equipment. It's also worth reinforcing that virtually all Shift4's merchants and all those that we have been adding throughout 2020 are operating at substantially below normal levels, which we anticipate is becoming quite the coiled spring. As previously announced, we also acquired two businesses in the latter part of 2020. Each very unique in serving different verticals and increasing both our capabilities and our TAM. The Shift4Shop acquisition has significantly expanded our capabilities to serve online merchants and dramatically expanded the market we are capable of addressing with our services. Taylor will provide some additional color on our month-to-month trends. But as I noted at the onset of the call, December volumes declined meaningfully as weather became colder and COVID cases accelerated resulting in stricter social distancing requirements across the country. And we will speak to the uncertainty that still exists from COVID. But what is clear to us is that our nonstop innovation and unique value proposition continues to win across a growing range of merchants and market segments. For those of you who are new to the story, we hope you see Q4 as a perfect example of our business model. We offer innovative solutions to merchants across a broad range of industry categories. Our technologies go far beyond traditional payment acceptance and often give us an incumbency advantage versus other payment providers. We use these advantages to offer a vertically integrated solution at a lower total cost of ownership than the competition. And lastly, we don't sit still and are constantly looking for new industries and geographies as evidenced by our acquisition of VenueNext, which Taylor is going to talk about shortly. As we spoke about on our last quarter's call and I described in my initial letter to shareholders at the IPO, our philosophy is to drive change where we see inefficiency and incremental value for our merchants and to ensure Shift4 is always positioned in the direction the puck is going. So as you may recall during 2020, Shift4 became the official payments partner for the Las Vegas Raiders, the first force in entertainment venue in our history. Within a few months, we have found significant successes across what was a pretty neglected vertical, supported by multiple expensive vendors and lots of legacy technology. We have found that our strength in serving some of the most complex and demanding environments in commerce has made us well suited to solve problems and deliver a better fan experience in sports stadiums, theme parks and other similar venues. This is why we're so excited to talk about our most recent acquisition of VenueNext, which again, Taylor will discuss shortly. On the same note, we just announced today that STAPLES Center will be using Shift4 payment technology. We believe stadiums and theme parks will contribute meaningful incremental intent volume in the months and years ahead. It was just a few months ago that we announced the acquisition of 3dcart eCommerce platform which again we now call Shift4Shop. Our entry into eCommerce came as a surprise to some, but I think it's worth reiterating this is textbook Shift4. We observed an industry category like eCommerce that is massive and growing quickly, yet unnecessarily complex and with multiple layers of fees. Taylor will speak about our go-to-market strategy with regard to Shift4Shop in a few minutes, which I also believe will drive a new layer of growth for our business. These are two new markets that are quite meaningful from a TAM perspective and were largely foreign to Shift4 at the time of our IPO just 9 months ago. Despite having operated this business for over 20 years, I can't recall a time when I was more optimistic about the road ahead. Our merchants are back to experiencing healthy volume growth with a very strong start to 2021. We continue to win share in our core markets and also find new exciting verticals to enter. We also have an impressive capital position right now that affords us the ability to invest in growth accelerants, for which I thank all of you again. And while I have the mic, I feel compelled to share a personal project and a call to action. As some of you may know, I am fortunate to command the first all civilian mission to space later this year, which will be a personal achievement beyond my wildest childhood dreams. And in reflecting on the significance of it, I couldn't help but think about all the children who don't get a chance to live out their dreams. It's for that reason that made St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, my co-pilot on this mission. We began very ambitious even for us fundraising campaign, and I would urge you all to consider a donation. And you can still visit inspiration4.com to learn more. And with that, let me turn the call over to Taylor to discuss our fourth quarter operating results in more detail. Taylor?