Earnings Call Transcript
Enova International, Inc. (ENVA)
Earnings Call Transcript - ENVA Q3 2025
Operator, Operator
Good day and welcome to the Enova International Third Quarter 2025 Earnings Conference Call. Please note this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Lindsay Savarese, Investor Relations for Enova. Please go ahead.
Lindsay Savarese, Investor Relations
Thank you, operator, and good afternoon, everyone. Enova released results for the third quarter 2025 ended September 30, 2025, this afternoon after market close. If you did not receive a copy of our earnings press release, you may obtain it from the Investor Relations section of our website at ir.enova.com. With me on today's call are David Fisher, Chief Executive Officer; and Steve Cunningham, Chief Financial Officer. This call is being webcast and will be archived on the Investor Relations section of our website. Before I turn the call over to David, I'd like to note that today's discussion will contain forward-looking statements and as such, is subject to risks and uncertainties. Actual results may differ materially as a result from various important risk factors, including those discussed in our earnings press release and in our annual report on Form 10-K, quarterly reports on Form 10-Q and current reports on Forms 8-K. Please note that any forward-looking statements that are made on this call are based on assumptions as of today, and we undertake no obligation to update these statements as a result of new information or future events. In addition to U.S. GAAP reporting, Enova reports certain financial measures that do not conform to generally accepted accounting principles. We believe these non-GAAP measures enhance the understanding of our performance. Reconciliations between these GAAP and non-GAAP measures are included in the tables found in today's press release. As noted in our earnings release, we have posted supplemental financial information on the IR portion of our website. And with that, I'd like to turn the call over to David.
David Fisher, CEO
Thanks, and good afternoon, everyone. I appreciate you joining our call today. We are pleased to report another great quarter, highlighted by solid loan growth and strong credit metrics across our portfolios, driven by our nimble online-only business model and well-diversified portfolio. Before we dive into the quarter, as a reminder, last quarter, we announced that Steve Cunningham, our CFO, will take over as CEO on January 1, at which time I will transition to the Executive Chairman role. I've committed to remain as Exec Chair for at least 2 years. Scott Cornelius, our Treasurer, will succeed Steve as CFO. Steve and Scott are preparing well for their new roles, and we expect a seamless transition with the continuation of our focused growth strategy and consistent performance. Now turning to the quarter. In Q3, we once again generated strong growth, supported by stable credit and significant operating leverage. Thanks to our diversified product offerings, the sophistication of our machine learning models and outstanding team, we've been able to consistently deliver significant portfolio growth while maintaining stable credit, resulting in strong financial results. Third quarter originations increased 22% year-over-year and 9% sequentially to almost $2 billion. The strong origination growth produced a 20% year-over-year increase in our combined loan and finance receivables to a record $4.5 billion. Small business products represented 66% of the total portfolio and consumer 34%. Revenue increased 16% year-over-year and 5% sequentially to $803 million in the third quarter. SMB revenue increased an impressive 29% year-over-year and 7% sequentially to a record $348 million, and our consumer revenue increased 8% year-over-year and 4% sequentially to $443 million. Overall, the stability of our customer base continues to underpin our growth as credit quality is solid across the portfolio. The consolidated net charge-off ratio for the quarter was 8.5% compared to 8.1% last quarter and 8.4% in Q3 of last year. Despite some noise in the macro environment, the underlying trends for our customers continue to be positive. The job market remains healthy with unemployment rates staying historically low at 4.3% as of August, and wage growth continues to outpace inflation for our target customers. In addition, August consumer spending data showed a meaningful uptick, reinforcing steady household demand. When looking at external data, it's helpful to keep a couple of key factors in mind. First, our consumer customers, in some ways, are always in a recession. As a result, they are adept at managing variabilities in their finances. Second, these customers tend to have jobs with more fungibility in terms of being able to move between companies. This can lead to less volatility in their earnings over time. Looking back to our Q2 earnings call, we discussed how early in the spring, we had seen some minor elevated default metrics in one of our consumer products. As we mentioned, in response, we tightened our credit models for that product, particularly for new customers. Because we're able to adjust so quickly, we avoided any significant impact to our consumer business. Taking swift action like this to adjust our models is routine for us. We're able to do this because of the rapid performance feedback we get as a result of the design of our products and the sophistication of our credit models. It's something we do all the time, hundreds of times per year, and this goes both ways, whether we're making adjustments to tighten credit or to expand it. So as expected, following the adjustment to this one product, credit performance has quickly returned to normal. In fact, credit in that product now exceeds our expectations with some of the lowest early default metrics we have witnessed. As a result, we've begun rapidly reaccelerating its growth. So looking forward to Q4, we expect to see consumer origination growth rates accelerate sequentially, and credit metrics continue to improve. Also contributing to our stable financial performance through market fluctuations are the benefits of having a diversified portfolio. Having operated in the nonprime space for decades, it's common to see short-term fluctuations in demand and credit in any one product or customer segment. In addition to being well diversified across our SMB and consumer businesses, within each of those, we offer a wide variety of products, adding multiple layers of diversification across our portfolio. This structure gives us the flexibility to allocate resources towards the strongest opportunities and have the confidence to moderate exposure where risks are elevated. With this in mind, we continue to see compelling opportunities within our SMB business, which had another fantastic quarter in Q3. Our leading brand presence, scale, solid credit and low levels of competition again resulted in solid demand and credit performance. Originations for SMB increased 11% sequentially and 31% year-over-year to nearly $1.4 billion in Q3. Insights from internal and external sources reflect solid underlying trends for small businesses. In conjunction with Ocrolus, we released the eighth iteration of our small business cash flow trend report earlier this week. This offers key insights into the state of small businesses and highlights ongoing trends observed over the past year. Small business confidence is high as tariffs remain manageable, and the economy, and in particular consumer spending, remains strong. Small business growth expectations stayed strong in Q3 with 93% of owners anticipating moderate to significant growth over the next year. And approximately 3/4 of small businesses were from nonbank lenders, with nearly 40% of those in business reporting being denied by traditional banks. Further, external data aligns with these observations. Small business sentiment reached a new high in the third quarter with the MetLife and U.S. Chamber of Commerce Small Business Index climbing to 72, its highest reading ever and up from 65.2% last quarter, signaling strong optimism across the sector. Driven by the operating leverage inherent in our online-only business, growth in EPS again outpaced both origination and revenue growth in Q3. Adjusted EPS increased 37% year-over-year, primarily as a result of our strong growth, efficient marketing and a lower cost of funds. Before I wrap up, I'd like to spend a few moments discussing our strategy and outlook for the remainder of 2025 and beyond. We've carefully designed our business with a thoughtful unit economics approach that has enabled us to operate profitably for more than 2 decades. This is through many different environments, including downturns in consumer spending, interest rate hikes, surges in inflation, not to mention the Great Recession and a global pandemic. During this time frame, we've successfully navigated periods where the unemployment rate was more than double where it is today. And our business is better prepared than ever to withstand changes in the macro environment as our technology and analytics continue to be more sophisticated and our balance sheet is stronger than ever, while our portfolio has become more diversified. I said this last quarter, but I've never been more excited about Enova's future. We have an incredibly experienced team, a strong foundation, a time-tested playbook and industry-leading products, all clear signs of the opportunity ahead of us. Steve and I share a common vision that our focused growth strategy will continue to steer our path forward. We continue to adapt and innovate and remain committed to producing sustainable and profitable growth while meeting the needs of our customers and driving shareholder value. With that, I would like to turn the call over to Steve Cunningham, our CFO, who will discuss our financial results and outlook in more detail. And following Steve's remarks, we'll be happy to answer any questions you may have.
Steven Cunningham, CFO
Thank you, David, and good afternoon, everyone. As David noted in his remarks, we're pleased to deliver another solid quarter of top and bottom line results that were in line or better than our expectations, with strong growth in originations, receivables and revenue, along with solid credit, operating efficiency and balance sheet flexibility. Turning to our third quarter results. Consistent with our expectations, total company revenue of $803 million increased 16% from the third quarter of 2024, driven by 20% year-over-year growth in total company combined loan and finance receivables balances on an amortized basis. Total company originations during the third quarter rose 22% from the third quarter of 2024 to nearly $2 billion. Revenue from small business lending increased 29% from the third quarter of 2024 to $348 million as small business receivables on an amortized basis ended the quarter at $3 billion or 26% higher than the end of the third quarter of 2024. Small business originations rose 31% year-over-year to $1.4 billion. Revenue from our consumer businesses increased 8% from the third quarter of 2024 to $443 million as consumer receivables on an amortized basis ended the third quarter at $1.5 billion or 9% higher than the end of the third quarter of 2024. Consumer originations grew 4% year-over-year to $590 million. As David mentioned, the slower consumer growth this quarter was intentional to ensure we were maintaining solid credit quality across the portfolio. For the fourth quarter of 2025, we expect total company revenue to be 10% to 15% higher than the fourth quarter of 2024 as a result of strong SMB growth and a reacceleration of growth in our consumer portfolios. This expectation will depend upon the level, timing and mix of originations growth during the quarter. Now turning to credit, which is the most significant driver of net revenue and portfolio fair value. Our consolidated credit performance continues to demonstrate that our diversified product offerings and discipline around our unit economics enable consistent results across different operating environments. The third quarter consolidated net revenue margin of 57.4% was in line with our expectations and reflects continued solid credit performance. The consolidated net charge-off ratio for the third quarter was 8.5%, flat to the third quarter of 2024 and reflects our typical consumer seasonality and continued strong small business credit performance. Sequential stability and year-over-year improvement in the consolidated 30-plus day delinquency rate and a stable consolidated portfolio fair value premium reflect our expectation of stable future consolidated portfolio credit performance. Small business credit performance remained strong. Sequentially and compared to the third quarter of 2024, the net charge-off ratio, the net revenue margin, fair value premium and 30-plus delinquency rate for our small business portfolio all improved and reflect continued and expected stable credit performance. Consumer credit also remained solid. Following our typical seasonality, the consumer net charge-off ratio rose sequentially to 16.1% for the third quarter, and while higher than the year-ago quarter, remained within our expected range. The consumer net revenue margin and credit metrics for the third quarter were influenced primarily by mix shifts and the rate of originations growth on the heels of consumer portfolio adjustments that we discussed last quarter. Those adjustments and our overall balanced approach to growth meaningfully reduced the year-over-year change in the consumer 30-plus delinquency rate compared to last quarter. And as David noted, we exited the third quarter with the lowest ever initial defaults on weekly vintages on the consumer product we adjusted, allowing us to accelerate sequential growth opportunities into the fourth quarter. Additionally, during the quarter, year-over-year consumer installment originations grew at the fastest rate that we've seen in several years as we saw higher demand from existing customers for refinancing and debt consolidation. This is another example of how the breadth of our consumer products and credit segments, combined with our disciplined approach to unit economics, enables us to navigate varying operating environments and generate consistent consolidated results. The fair value premium on our consumer portfolio at the end of the third quarter was flat to last quarter and remained consistent with levels observed over the past 2 years, indicating a stable risk-return profile and strong underlying unit economics for our portfolio. Looking ahead, we expect the total company net revenue margin for the fourth quarter of 2025 to be in the range of 55% to 60%. This expectation will depend upon portfolio payment performance and the level, timing and mix of originations growth during the quarter. Now turning to expenses. Total operating expenses for the third quarter, including marketing, were 31% of revenue compared to 34% of revenue in the third quarter of 2024 as we continue to see the benefits of our efficient marketing activities, the leverage inherent in our online-only model, and thoughtful expense management. Our marketing spend continues to be efficient, driving strong originations growth, and was in line with our guidance range for the quarter. Marketing costs as a percentage of revenue were 18% compared to 20% for the third quarter of 2024. We expect marketing expenses to be around 20% of revenue for the fourth quarter, but it will depend upon the growth and mix of originations. Operations and technology expenses, which were driven by growth in receivables and originations, were 8% of revenue for the third quarter, similar to the third quarter of 2024. Given the significant variable component of this expense category, sequential expenses and O&T costs should be expected in an environment where originations and receivables are growing and should be between 8% to 8.5% of total revenue. Our fixed costs continue to scale as we focus on operating efficiency and thoughtful expense management. General and administrative expenses for the third quarter increased to $40 million or 5% of revenue versus $39 million or 6% of revenue in the third quarter of 2024. While there may be slight variations from quarter to quarter, we expect G&A expenses in the near term should be between 5% and 5.5% of total revenue. We continue to deliver solid profitability and strong returns on equity this quarter. Compared to the third quarter of 2024, adjusted EPS, a non-GAAP measure, increased 37% to $3.36 per diluted share, delivering an annualized third quarter return on equity of 28%. We ended the third quarter with $1.2 billion of liquidity, including $366 million of cash and marketable securities and $816 million of available capacity on debt facilities. Our cost of funds declined to 8.6% or 15 basis points lower sequentially and nearly 100 basis points lower than the third quarter of 2024 as a result of lower short-term interest rates and strong execution on recent financing transactions. Continuing our track record of strong capital markets execution reflects our solid credit performance. During the third quarter, we upsized our corporate revolver by $160 million to $825 million, extending the final maturity to 2029, reduced the cost by 25 basis points, and expanded our bank lender group. Our balance sheet and liquidity position remains strong and give us the financial flexibility to successfully navigate a range of operating environments while delivering on our commitment to drive long-term shareholder value through both continued investments in our business and share repurchases. During the third quarter, we acquired 339,000 shares at a cost of $38 million, and we started the fourth quarter with share repurchase capacity of approximately $80 million. Before wrapping up with our fourth quarter expectations, I'd like to touch on our valuation. Enova has delivered strong and consistent results over many years and operates a highly scalable online-only model with more diversification than any nonbank specialty finance company. Since our acquisition of OnDeck 5 years ago, we've not only maintained our strong profit margins, we've done so while cutting our consolidated net charge-off rate in half. Our demonstrated world-class risk management capabilities and approach to unit economic decisioning has driven our differentiated financial performance and return on equity as well as our ability to finance the business at market-leading spreads. To put this in perspective, Enova has never reported a quarter of negative adjusted EPS. And over the past 10 years, has delivered $1.8 billion of adjusted net income and grown annual adjusted EPS at a compound average annual growth rate of approximately 20%. Over that same time, we reduced our financing costs by hundreds of basis points from lower credit spreads that are a direct result of our portfolio credit performance and predictability. Despite our demonstrated operating model advantages and unmatched financial performance as a public company, we remain frustrated by a persistent valuation gap. We continue to trade at discounts to the S&P 600 and Russell 2000, the financial components of each of those indexes, and to other specialty finance lenders that have less consistent performance and profitability. In fact, at the end of the third quarter, Enova traded at a similar price multiple on 2026 consensus adjusted EPS estimates but similar to 2016 and 2017 forward PE ratios when we were a much smaller consumer-centric company. We continue to believe there is meaningful upside to our current share price and continuing to unlock the value our company creates remains a top focus of Enova's leadership. You should expect that we will continue our focus on growth with financial consistency and we'll continue to lean into our capital returns through opportunistic share repurchases. To wrap up, let me summarize our fourth quarter expectations. For the fourth quarter, we expect consolidated revenue to be 10% to 15% higher than the fourth quarter of 2024, with a net revenue margin in the range of 55% to 60%. Additionally, we expect marketing expenses to be around 20% of revenue, O&T costs to be between 8% to 8.5% of revenue, and G&A costs to be between 5% and 5.5% of revenue. These expectations should lead to adjusted EPS for the fourth quarter of 2025 that is 20% to 25% higher than the fourth quarter of 2024. Our fourth quarter expectations will depend upon the path of the macroeconomic environment and the resulting impact on demand, customer payment rates, and the level, timing and mix of originations growth. Our third quarter results reflect the strength of our diversified product offerings and the ability of our team to consistently deliver strong growth, revenue, and profitability while maintaining solid credit. Our operating model has now delivered 6 consecutive quarters of year-over-year adjusted EPS growth of at least 25% or more, and we remain confident in our ability to generate meaningful financial results for the remainder of 2025 and beyond. And with that, we'd be happy to take your questions.
Operator, Operator
The first question today comes from David Scharf with Citizens Capital Markets.
David Scharf, Analyst
Congratulations again. Dave and Steve, you're the latest. What's becoming a long line of lenders that have reported very stable, positive and constructive credit commentary this earnings season. So I'm going to leave the credit questions to some others to ask about. I was curious, maybe 2 more granular things. One is just on kind of capital actions. This is, I think, similar commentary on how you perceive the stock's valuation as you provided in the last couple of calls. Is there any kind of update you can provide us on whether you would ever consider seeking additional covenant relief to return potentially even more capital in terms of buybacks or whether a dividend is potentially something the Board would consider?
David Fisher, CEO
I believe all options are possible. There are many ways to utilize our excess cash over time, and we have substantial excess capital. We could explore different approaches to potentially diversify our businesses further and improve our valuation. As Steve highlighted in his remarks, our business has shown an impressive performance over the past several years, evolving significantly in terms of stability, diversification, and balance sheet strength. It doesn't align with our view of the business's value to be trading at the same P/E ratios as we did years ago. Therefore, we see opportunities to enhance the buyback, as our returns on past buybacks have been very strong. A dividend could also be considered at the right time, although I believe that is usually more effective when the stock is fully valued. Additionally, we are looking at other opportunities in the market where we could apply our capital.
David Scharf, Analyst
Understood. Understood. Maybe as a follow-up, on the marketing side, there have been quite a number of quarters now where at least as a percentage of revenue, marketing dollars have come in below your guidance. And I think you guided to 20% last quarter, it came in at 18% again. And at some point, trying to figure out what's a feature versus a bug. And are you seeing anything about the composition of either by channel or just percentage of repeat borrowers or just maybe it's the mix shift towards more SMB. But is there anything that would kind of lead you to tell us structurally the operating model is potentially more profitable than we've been sort of modeling and that 20% is maybe too high a ceiling?
David Fisher, CEO
Yes. I mean, look, the model continues to get more profitable, and I'll give a lot of credit to our marketing and business teams who are continuing to get more efficient on the marketing and acquisition and conversion side; those all tie together. But some of it's also just a confluence of events. If you kind of go back to Q4 of last year, volume came really, really late in the quarter. And so we probably underspent because we didn't see the volume earlier in the quarter. Q1, there was just a tremendous amount of volume that we never would expect to see in Q1. So we're probably underspending again. And then we had a lot of excess revenue from the strong Q4 and Q1 kind of increasing the denominator for Q2 where actually the spend was actually kind of pretty near where we would have thought it was going to be. And then, as we talked about in Q3, we pulled back a bit on the consumer side just while we were letting the credit settle in that one consumer product. So as we look for Q4 as we're now accelerating growth, especially on the consumer side. Now the credit, as I mentioned in my prepared remarks, credit looks incredibly good right now, not just solid. I mean it looks incredibly good at the moment. We're going to lean into that accelerated growth. And look, a lot can change between now and the end of the year, and it's hard to predict the holiday season. But we would expect higher levels of spend in Q4.
Operator, Operator
The next question comes from Bill Ryan with Seaport Research Partners.
William Ryan, Analyst
Question on the growth outlook. I mean you obviously seem very optimistic on the consumer originations going into Q4. Looking at Q3, consumer installment, as you noted, was very, very strong, with a little bit of decline in consumer line of credit originations. I presume that might be reflective of the tightening and kind of the wait-and-see approach you took from Q2 to Q3. Just was that the case? And do you expect kind of a mix of growth between the 2 products going into Q4, like a reacceleration in line of credit?
David Fisher, CEO
Yes. I mean, very observant view, Bill, so I'll give you credit for sure. Steve guessed that someone was going to pick that up and he was right. So yes, that was the product. And yes, that is where we're expecting the most acceleration going into Q4. Again, we're filling demand here. So we don't always know for sure. But that is certainly our expectation on the consumer side that we'll see a reacceleration of that line of credit and a mix shift in favor of line of credit. Not that there's any issue with installment right now; there's not. But there's just more acceleration opportunities in line of credit given the slight pullback we had intentionally in Q3.
William Ryan, Analyst
Okay. And I assume this might relate to that as well, but the change in fair value on the consumer loan portfolio, a little bit of an uptick in Q3 as well. I assume was that related to some of the adjustments that were made.
Steven Cunningham, CFO
Yes. I mean, if you think about the change in fair value line item in terms of dollars, there's 2 components. One of them is the back book sort of running its course, which the fair value premium was very stable. So all of that was as expected as we just sort of continue to mature the back book. The bigger difference would have been the slower originations growth overall on the consumer portfolio, which would have been a negative in the change in fair value line item for the quarter.
Operator, Operator
The next question comes from Vincent Caintic with BTIG.
Vincent Caintic, Analyst
I have a question regarding credit. Your credit trends have been strong in both SMB and consumer sectors. I'm curious about the applications you're receiving or the broader industry outlook. Do you see any potential deterioration, perhaps in specific areas where applications may be increasing but performance is declining?
David Fisher, CEO
We adjust credit hundreds of times each quarter, so there are always minor changes. However, there are no significant issues. Our subprime business has some of the best credit metrics we’ve experienced in a long time, and our near-prime business also reflects strong credit metrics. It's a widespread trend. I understand there have been many questions, particularly regarding subprime auto and a couple of older vintages, but one vintage doesn't signify much. Subprime auto has historically been unrelated to our operations; it's primarily influenced by asset prices and supply and demand. Overall, we are observing excellent credit across both consumers and small businesses, which isn’t surprising given the strong economy, robust job market, and moderated inflation. Therefore, we don’t have any concerns in any areas at this moment.
Vincent Caintic, Analyst
Okay. Great. And I guess relatedly, on the competitive front, so I know maybe banks aren't your direct competitors, but some of the failings that maybe have happened amongst other lenders, particularly in commercial side, there may be some of those lenders are now relooking at their portfolios and so forth and maybe tightening up a bit. So I'm kind of wondering if you're seeing that and if in turn, that allows you to take more share and maybe that's part of the marketing opportunities that you're seeing. If you could talk about that.
David Fisher, CEO
Yes, we continue to observe that banks are being very conservative in the small business sector, which has created significant opportunities for us over the years. This trend hasn't changed; if anything, we've noticed even more caution from banks, which has been beneficial for us. On the consumer side, there haven't been any new players entering that market for quite some time. When we see established lenders attempt to explore near-prime lending, they quickly withdraw because their business models don't align with that type of lending. They're not equipped to lend at rates above 36%, just as we wouldn't be effective at lending at 12% or 18%. We don't compete with Capital One, and they seem to be aware of the advantages we have. Overall, the competitive landscape remains favorable for us, and we haven't noticed significant changes in that regard.
Operator, Operator
The next question comes from Kyle Joseph with Stephens.
Kyle Joseph, Analyst
Just in terms of growth, obviously, it's been weighted towards the small business side of things and kind of you guys mentioned kind of the credit blip you saw in the spring. But yes, touching on competitive dynamics, and then I think you mentioned that you expect consumer to reaccelerate. Just give us a sense for kind of the competitive dynamics between the 2.
David Fisher, CEO
We don't intentionally prioritize growth in one area over another. As we've indicated, our approach is guided by our unit economics framework. We have available capital, so wherever we can originate loans that meet our return on equity targets, we will do so, allowing market conditions to influence our decisions. Over the past two years, the differences in growth rates between the two sectors have primarily been driven by market and credit conditions. For instance, in 2023, consumer growth exceeded small business growth significantly, while this year, small business is currently outpacing consumer. This is a natural fluctuation, and we may see it shift again soon, particularly with a resurgence in consumer activity. Looking ahead, we're uncertain, but we are confident in our range of strong products within the non-prime credit market. If one sector shows more strength, we will adapt and leverage that diversity. For now, we are focusing our efforts on consumer growth, especially given the favorable credit conditions we are experiencing there. We maintain a balance between growth and credit risk and have always approached expansion carefully, and we continue to do so. The credit outlook for consumer lending is especially promising right now, and we are strategically invested in it.
Operator, Operator
The next question comes from Alexander Villalobos with Jefferies.
Alexander Villalobos-Morsink, Analyst
Congrats on the results. My question was more on the cap market side and just interest expense. I know you guys generate a ton of cash. And is there anything on the bond side or just cap market side where you guys can, in the future, kind of lower the interest expense a little bit more and kind of get a little more push on the EPS side from there?
Steven Cunningham, CFO
Yes, for sure. So we've talked about the expectation that we're going to see lower benchmark rates in the short end of the curve, which is where we tend to fund. So that we expect over the near term over the next year or 2, that's going to be a tailwind for us. But more importantly, just the performance of the portfolio has allowed us just to continue to bring our spreads down. You saw that I mentioned in my commentary. Every transaction here over the last year or so, we've talked about the decline in the credit spreads over the benchmark because of that performance. So I think there's clearly some opportunity between those 2 things to capture some of the tailwinds in the capital markets to help support growth in EPS.
Operator, Operator
The next question comes from John Hecht with Jefferies.
John Hecht, Analyst
I'll ask just one broad question. You've got rates declining, which presents very good consistent current trends. The competitive environment appears to be favorable for you, but there is a high level of prepayment activity that seems linked to excessive liquidity in the system. So it seems like things are good, but they are somewhat fluctuating. How do these factors influence your thinking regarding near-term and intermediate-term strategies?
David Fisher, CEO
Yes, it was somewhat difficult to catch everything due to the background noise. From a competitive standpoint, there isn't much new to discuss. You inquired about elevated prepayments. In the subprime and near-prime markets, that doesn't significantly impact us, as our customers require cash. Therefore, we don't often see that happening. We remain cautious about Enova, as this isn’t a focus for us. However, our model and products appear to be very strong and stable at the moment. We aren't noticing any significant issues or changes apart from improving credit. Our customer base looks robust across all metrics we consider. Prepayment rates remain unchanged, and average loan sizes are consistent. We aren't observing variations in customer price sensitivity. Overall, the environment is quite stable right now. We acknowledge that this could change, and we are monitoring the metrics daily. But as of now, everything seems very stable.
Operator, Operator
The next question comes from John Rowan with Janney.
John Rowan, Analyst
Obviously, you spent a lot of time talking about current credit, given obviously what's going on in the news. But maybe just touch on quickly what you think about 2026, in particular, think about what's going on with tax laws and tips and overtime and changes to child care tax credit and some of those other programs. Just give us an idea of maybe how much of your consumers are impacted by some of those large changes in tax policy.
David Fisher, CEO
Yes. Well, I think the estimates are for higher tax refunds next year, which should help with credit. And then, look, I think this year, we saw what we thought was going to be one of the bigger impacts, which was the resumption of payments on student loans and the resumption of collections on student loans. And we've been able to navigate with that with no problem at all. And I think some of the tax changes next year kind of pale in comparison to that in terms of magnitude and if anything are likely to be helpful. So again, we don't know until it actually plays out, but it doesn't seem like it's going to be an issue for us at all.
Operator, Operator
The next question comes from Moshe Orenbuch with TD Cowen.
Moshe Orenbuch, Analyst
Most of my questions have already been addressed. However, I was hoping to discuss your focus on the line of credit aspect for consumers, especially since the consumer sector appears to be much stronger in Q4 compared to Q3. With this approach, should we expect less origination in the small business sector, or will you be investing more heavily in Q4?
David Fisher, CEO
Completely incremental. As you know, we have plenty of excess capital. I think we had about $1 billion of excess liquidity at the end of Q3. So we have plenty of capital to invest in both in Q4. SMB looks really good as well. They had an outstanding Q3, and that momentum has continued into Q4. The only reason we haven't discussed SMB more is that it's performing well and continues to do so. We have enough capital to keep that business moving at full speed. The change is mainly on the consumer side where, now that we are accelerating growth again, we should see stronger growth in the consumer book.
Steven Cunningham, CFO
Moshe, as we've discussed, we have the necessary capital and liquidity to support both organic growth and buybacks. Our buyback program is opportunistic. This quarter, we purchased 60% of our capacity, and we reached an all-time high for a few weeks. At those elevated levels, we would have continued buying, but at a lower amount than we would now. During those quarters when we were buying nearly all our capacity, we were trading at a different level than we are today. You can expect us to maintain this strategy. We have around $80 million available in Q4, as we kept some reserves in case of future volatility. We'll remain opportunistic and aim to buy as much as possible within that program while also striving for rapid growth in our balanced approach.
Operator, Operator
This concludes our question-and-answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to David Fisher for any closing remarks.
David Fisher, CEO
Thanks, everyone, for joining our call today. We certainly appreciate it and look forward to speaking with you again next quarter. Have a good evening.