Joe Fisher
Analyst · Barclays. Please ask you question
Thank you, Jack and thank you to everyone on today’s call for your interest in Navient. During my prepared remarks, I will review the second quarter results for 2021. I will be referencing the earnings call presentation, which can be found on the company’s website in the Investors section. Our second quarter results compared to our original outlook for 2021 is provided on Slide 4. We are currently on pace to exceed all of our original targets provided at the beginning of the year. As a result of the strong first half and updated outlook, we are increasing the range of our adjusted core earnings per share guidance to a range of $4.20 to $4.30, an increase of over 34% compared to our original guidance. Our outlook excludes regulatory and restructuring costs, reflects a favorable interest rate environment includes the announced debt repurchases and utilizing the remaining share repurchase authority, of $300 million. Key highlights from the quarter, beginning on Slide 5, include GAAP EPS of $1.05 and adjusted core EPS of $0.98. Charge-offs on both FFELP and private education loans remain at historic lows, originated $1.3 billion of private education loans, achieved BPS EBITDA margin of 30% in the quarter, strengthened our capital position and returned $227 million to shareholders in the form of repurchases and dividends. Let’s move to segment reporting, beginning with federal education loans on Slide 6. Net interest margin declined 10 basis points from the prior year and remained flat at 97 basis points compared to the first quarter. The decline from the prior year was expected following the annual resets on certain loans that occurred on July 1, 2020 and reduced floor income by $30 million compared to the year ago quarter. When adjusting for this event, net interest income was flat year-over-year at $141 million despite a decline in the portfolio of 9%. This portfolio continues to benefit from the favorable interest rate environment and ongoing improvement in funding costs. FFELP borrowers transition back to repayment. Total delinquency rates have remained stable at 8.3%, while charge-offs remain at historically low levels. As more borrowers transition into repaying statuses, we expect these levels to revert towards pre-pandemic levels. Fee income and operating expenses in this segment declined primarily as a result of the expected decreases in asset recovery volume, impact of COVID-19 on certain operational activities and improvements in operating efficiencies. Now, let’s turn to Slide 7 and our Consumer Lending segment. The net interest margin of 295 basis points is above our guided range and is 25 basis points lower than the year ago quarter, largely driven by a shift toward our high-quality private refi product within our Consumer Lending portfolio, which now accounts for 40% of total loans in the segment. The negative $1 million provision in the quarter was comprised largely of three components: first, a $9 million decrease in the expected losses for the total portfolio; second, a $5 million lease in connection with the sale of $30 million of legacy private education loans; and third, a $13 million increase related to $1.3 billion of newly originated high-quality education loans in the quarter. While we have seen an improvement in the current economic conditions, our allowance reflects the uncertainty related to the potential negative impact to the portfolio from the end of various payment relief and stimulus benefits that are currently forecasted to end this year. As borrowers continue to transition to repayment, we feel confident that we are adequately reserved given the well-seasoned and high credit quality of our portfolio. Let’s continue to Slide 8 to review our Business Processing segment. The $66 million increase in revenue from the prior year is largely due to supporting states and their efforts to provide unemployment benefits, contact tracing and vaccine administration as well as an increase in revenue from our traditional business processing services. Leveraging our existing technology and infrastructure allowed us to exceed our original EBITDA targets and achieve EBITDA margins of 30%. As the economy reopens and these contracts begin to wind down, we expect to see a decline in associated revenue. The growth in revenue in this segment resulted in a $35 million increase in expenses in the quarter, which led to increased total operating expenses for the company. The overall efficiency ratio for the company of 51% in the quarter is outperforming our original target set at the beginning of the year even as our growth businesses contribute a larger proportion to our overall revenue and expenses. Let’s turn to our financing and capital allocation activity that is highlighted on Slide 9. During the quarter, we utilized the cash raised from our unsecured debt issuance and loan sale transactions from earlier this year, along with operating cash flows to reduce our existing unsecured debt footprint by $692 million, resulting in a repurchase loss of $12 million. Subsequent to our second quarter results on July 12, we retired an additional $750 million of unsecured debt that was set to expire in January of 2022 which will result in an estimated repurchase loss of $20 million in the third quarter. We have no existing maturities for the remainder of 2021 and have reduced our total unsecured debt due in 2022 to under $1 billion. During the quarter, we repurchased 11.8 million shares at an average price of $17.02, all while improving our ATE ratio to 6.3%. The cumulative negative mark-to-market losses related to derivative accounting declined by 8% to $459 million in the quarter, mainly due to the natural passage of time. Excluding these temporary mark-to-market losses, which will reverse to zero as contracts mature, our adjusted tangible equity ratio is 8.0%. We expect to execute the remaining $300 million of authority over the remainder of the year. In the quarter, we sold $30 million of private education loans, resulting in a gain-on-sale of $2.5 million. This was a follow-on sale related to the larger legacy loan sale that occurred at the end of the first quarter. We do not forecast any additional loan sales in our guidance for the remainder of the year. During the quarter, we issued $2.1 billion of term-funded ABS. The demand for both FFELP and private ABS continues to be strong. Our most recent issuance that priced on July 19 was 11 basis points tighter or 15% better than the previous private education refi transaction and was 4x oversubscribed. These transactions, combined with improved financing efficiency in our facilities, demonstrate our ability to lower our cost of funds while managing our debt maturity profile to better align to the cash flow projections of our total education loan portfolio. Turning to GAAP results on Slide 10, we recorded second quarter GAAP net income of $185 million or $1.05 per share compared with net income of $125 million or $0.64 per share in the second quarter of 2020. In summary, this quarter’s results demonstrate the continued dedication from team Navient to meet the challenges and needs of our customers. The outperformance both in the quarter and year-to-date across the company positions us well for the remainder of 2021 to exceed all of our original targets, maintain our strong capital position, utilize the full remaining authority of $300 million for share repurchases and achieve earnings per share of $4.20 to $4.30. Thank you for your time. And I will now open the call for questions.