Affirm CEO Max Levchin Talks Revenue Growth, Consumer Spending

**Tim Stenovec** (0:02)
Bloomberg Audio Studios. I'm watching shares of a firm. They jumped as much as 17% in trading to the highest and today going back to September of 2025 This after the FinTech company forecast revenue for the first quarter that beat the average analyst estimate. Shares now higher by about 2.4%, so giving up some of those gains. Separately, the company and Shopify expanded their global partnership to launch shop pay installments in Australia.
We got Max with us, Max Levchin. He's the CEO of Affirm. He joins us from our San Francisco Bureau. Max, welcome back to Bloomberg Businessweek Daily. Always good to see you. We're going to get to the results, but before that, I want to talk about the consumer because you have this great real time view using what many people would argue is, you know, crucial alternative data to understand the view of the consumer. How would you describe the American consumer right now?

**Max Levchin** (0:52)
You know, I think the Affirm consumer, the ones we interact with all the time and see is healthy. They are paying us back on time. They are shopping. They are taking advantage of the 0% deals that we also offer them. So all those things are still going swimmingly. I think it's impossible to ignore that gas prices are elevated for them, just like anyone else. I think inflation, as you just heard, Chairman of Federal Reserve, Telus is still stubbornly sticking above its target. I think they are stretching their budgets when they need to do it. And frankly, that actually accretes to the demand for Affirm. So in some ways, we are asked by our consumers to step up to the plate and help them manage their family budgets more often in the current environment. But by and large, they are healthy.

**Lisa Mateo** (1:35)
But what are they buying? Are they buying these high-expensive items? Or are they using this program to buy things like, you know, to pay for utility bills, to do things like that? What are they buying and what are they using it for?

**Max Levchin** (1:49)
Again, in our portfolio, by far, we are called upon to finance homewares, sporting equipment. There's a lot of back-to-school expenses that families incur right now. So everybody's buying something for their kids if those are going back to school. So that's the bread and butter of a firm that has been for a very long time.
Generally speaking, we are not huge fans of financing for current transactions and take steps to make sure our consumers don't give themselves sense of security by stretching something that is a subscription into a longer subscription. That's not a financially healthy decision. As you know, we don't charge late fees specifically so we can align ourselves with our borrowers. When they borrow without a clear plan to pay us back, we will just lose money. And so we routinely orient our models to decline applications for loans that imply pushing off of the financial responsibility. We love our consumers to be financially responsible. We are here to help them be so.

**Tim Stenovec** (2:43)
Are you noticing any changes in the rate of declines when somebody is applying to use a firm?

**Max Levchin** (2:51)
The rate of decline is something that we set.
In fact, if you wanted to do a super short crash course on how a firm works, we set an acceptable loss rate for us, given macroeconomic signals that we get to see. That dictates the rate of approval, rate of decline as a function, of course, of the credit quality.

**Tim Stenovec** (3:06)
So it doesn't change based on the individual who is applying for it?

**Max Levchin** (3:10)
It absolutely changes. What I'm saying is that we work backwards from the question you posed. We decide what our acceptable loss rate will look like, and that in turn sets or dictates what the approval rates will be.
If you want to take a very macro view of our position relative to the credit application set that we see every day, we're probably slightly more restrictive than we were this time last year, but again, nothing dramatic.

**Lisa Mateo** (3:35)
So how do you compare to the competition out there? There's Klarna, there's other ways. There's traditional credit cards as well. What sets you apart from that?

**Max Levchin** (3:44)
Well, first of all, I think our results do set us apart.
I don't want to throw shade on anyone, but I think we've grown 30 plus percent for the last 11 quarters of memory serves and for 12 months, we've been consistently got profitable and many other accolades, and we may be the only ones in the space that have been able to print these consistent results while growing really quickly while remaining profitable. So at least we are a really well-managed company, I would argue.