TheStreet Pro’s Stephen Guilfoyle has a soft spot for SoFi.
The veteran trader thinks very highly of the fintech company, which on April 29 beat Wall Street’s first-quarter-earnings expectations and raised its guidance for the year.
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“I may be biased,” he told readers in his TheStreet Pro column. “Heck, we both know that I am. I am long the shares and have been writing favorable on the stock for some time now.
“That said, in my opinion, to say that CEO Anthony Noto and SoFi Technologies were merely executing at an extremely high level would be quite the understatement.”
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Noto told analysts during the earnings call that “we’re off to a tremendous start in 2025 as we continue to drive durable growth and strong returns through our product innovation and brand building.”
SoFi CEO Anthony Noto said the company was ‘off to a tremendous start in 2025.’
Veteran trader: SoFi had a great quarter
SoFi’s revenue grew 33% year-over-year, Noto said, the fastest growth in five quarters.
“This is a great quarter,” Guilfoyle said. “The guidance raise is simply more to like.”
And Guilfoyle, whose career dates back to the floor of the New York Stock Exchange in the 1980s, is not alone in his admiration for the San Francisco company.Â
Barclays boosted its price target on SoFi to $12 from $11 while affirming an equal weight rating on the shares.
SoFi’s adjusted revenue beat expectations by 4%, driven by the lending segment, while financial services and tech were roughly in line, the firm said.Â
Citizens JMP kicked off coverage of SoFi Technologies on April 24 with an outperform rating and $17 price target, implying 38% upside from current levels.Â
The firm cited the company’s growth trajectory, improving profitability profile, and undervaluation relative to its earnings potential over time for the outperform rating.Â
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SoFi is at an inflection point, with substantial earnings potential that the market is undervaluing, creating a compelling long-term investment opportunity, the analyst tells investors in a research note.
Citizens JMP says the company has a “massive addressable market opportunity with proven growth.”
Crypto optimism at SoFi
SoFi’s shares are down nearly 20% since January but up 83% from a year ago.Â
The company was forced to drop cryptocurrency investing in late 2023 as part of becoming a regulated bank, but Noto said that’s about to change.
President Donald Trump has made clear that his administration will be crypto-friendly. In January, signed an executive order aimed to promote U.S. “leadership in digital assets and financial technology while protecting economic liberty.”
The Officer of the Comptroller of the Currency, which charters, regulates and supervises all national banks and federal savings associations, streamlined the process for crypto activities by banks.
“We were forced to eliminate that when we became a bank, but with the OCC’s recent articulation about their rules and interpretive letter, we will be able to reenter the crypto business and offering our members to buy, sell, and hold crypto assets,” Noto said. “And our goals to be there in the next six to 18 months.”
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The Federal Reserve also withdrew three pieces of Biden-era guidance related to banks’ engagement in cryptocurrency and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. also eased its crypto rules for banks.
“Given the evolving regulatory landscape we see an opportunity to reenter the crypto and blockchain business more comprehensively,” Noto said. “In addition to enabling members to invest in crypto coins, we will enter other areas over the next six to 24 months but potentially much sooner via acquisition or if the changing regulatory landscape allows.”
SoFi’s crypto “aspirations over time are as broad and deep as they are for existing SoFi business,” Noto added, “including developing crypto and blockchain offerings across borrowing, investing, paying, saving and our technology platform services for third parties.”
SoFi CEO: Getting inbound calls for acquisitions
Noto was also bullish on the fintech sector, telling analysts that “if you’re a traditional financial institution or you’re a big consumer brand that has financial services products, you really have gotten away the last three years without innovating.”
“And the reason we’ve gotten away from away with it is because of the regulatory environment,” he said, “because the backdrop of the economy and interest rates going higher.”Â
“But in an environment where interest rates stay stable where we’re at and we have a stable economy, these financial institutions need to start to compete or they’re going to keep losing share.”
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Noto said SoFi has had “more inbound calls than we’ve ever had for acquisitions and more inbound calls for partnerships than we’ve had in three years.”
“And it’s because of the fact that capital is coming back to the fintech sector,” he said.
Guilfoyle was pleased with what Noto had to say and he reiterated his $18.50 price target with an upside basis.
“Right now, the firm is doing everything right,” he said. “Membership, product sales and the financial services sector are all growing like a weed, while technology and lending sectors are growing steadily.”
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