SOFI valuation premium is too high for a strong buy; considered a hold or entry point only for small positions, with larger buys requiring a discount.

Sofie is one of the most popular stocks in the market, but here's a fun fact for you: this stock has fallen by 2.5% over the past five years . It was extremely volatile, and a great win if you bought it at the right time, but it's crazy how much attention Sophie is getting.

This stock made no progress during that period. Yes, and this doesn't look like a stock chart for a bank, does it? As you know, this is the first question about it, sort of. Are we talking about a bank or not?

Because they have the word " technology" in their name.

They tell me they are a superior application for digital financial services. But when you look at what they do, they offer checking accounts and savings accounts. They offer credit cards.

They handle automated investing, credit monitoring, personal loans, student loans, and mortgages. It looks like a bank.

As you know, total return may sound like a bank, but man, they've had a rocky journey to get there.

Okay, let's define what this work is because I think that's important. The graph we have here shows the number of members and the total number of products. So, when you look at their earnings report, this is one of the things they always report first.

This is what really sets it apart from most traditional banks. Most conventional banks will not grow at a compound annual growth rate of 40 to 50% , and in fact they have been quite consistent with that until recently, you know, at a compound annual growth rate of well over 30%.

So, it is definitely a growth company, whether it is a bank or not.

But the products, I think this is important to understand. Therefore, they divide it into three sectors: lending , technology services , and their financial services. So, lending products are actually where they started.

These were loans that no one else was willing to provide. Personal loans, student loans, and only recently have they really entered areas such as mortgages.

So you're saying that's a good place to start, but you really need to mature as a company to be taken seriously in those financial services, and perhaps you should be valued more as a bank if you're taking those kinds of risks that banks don't want to take on?

Okay, yes. I mean, they exaggerated something and got the desired results from it. Their growth is impressive by banking standards. It is very shallow growth.

One notable thing regarding the ratio of members to total products is that the total number of products now barely reaches two products per member or so. This is unfortunate. It's less than two, yes.

Yes. This is unfortunate for a bank. The small, traditional community bank on your street performs better than that. And certainly, the big banks, the ones they would like to be in the same league as, are performing much better than that.

But that's not what they focused on. They focused on using pricing to increase their membership as quickly as possible , and it worked for them. This is not criticism. This is simply the reality.

They are approaching the law of large numbers. You can't rely solely on pricing to continue growing indefinitely the way they did. Therefore, they need to add more products and focus more on increasing the number of products per customer to reach the standards of community banks, if not the standards of large banks.

Can they do that through pricing? Perhaps, but will that affect profitability ? Do some realities of banking impose themselves, such that the more they try to add banking products, the more they become like a bank?

And the more they need to compete with other banks.

I think this is the real dilemma regarding evaluation. This does not make the company less of a quality. I think it's good to see the company maturing in this way, but I think investors need to be aware of the real-world implications of that.

Now, let's delve into some of those details about the company and how they announce their earnings. What we are looking at here is lending revenue and profit from contributing to lending.

This is what they report each quarter for lending technology services and then financial services.

Therefore, lending revenues continue to grow and remain fairly profitable. This is where you will find the essence of the conversation. If you listen to a conference call, much of the conversation sounds more like banking.

Do you know what the failure rate is? What type of interest rates do you charge? What is the profit margin?

Is this an area where you look at what SoFi is doing? Incidentally, they also have a loan platform business where they give loans to someone and then sell them directly to an investor.

These revenues do not fall under this sector, but actually go to the financial services sector.

So, I just wanted to highlight that . But removing some of the risks from the balance sheet makes it look more like a technology company. But when lending continues to grow in this way, you need capital to do it.

Therefore, you are taking risks similar to those of banks.

So, are you saying: "Hey, if it looks like a bank, lends like a bank, and takes risks like banks, then maybe it should be evaluated as a bank"? At some point.

And look at the fast-growing banks, yes, they are already selling loans. We have a name for that in the banking industry. It is "warehouse finance" or " wholesale banking". It has been around since the 1950s as well.

So, they do it using technology , but much of what I honestly see—and this isn't limited to Sophie—much of what fintech companies market as innovation looks more like better marketing or new distribution channels that exploit technology to their advantage.

These are good things, and they can justify some kind of price premium because they may lead to growth. But yes, ultimately, this is banking. This is buying and selling money and making a profit from the difference.

We have a way of pricing that. We have been doing this for over a hundred years, and there are many other good companies doing it alongside them.

Therefore, I believe we should give them credit for their growth characteristics. We need to understand how they got there in terms of pricing. But we need to give them credit for that, while at the same time recognizing that these are actions we understand and know how to evaluate.

Let's review the other two sectors. I think this is important for understanding as well. Technology platform business. You can see here that they have lost one major client. I think it was a "Chime" company at the end of 2025.

That's why you're seeing a recent drop in revenue.

But what this essentially means is a type of banking service that they provide under a white label for the benefit of other parties. For example, "H& R Block" is one of their clients.

If you have one of the high- yield savings accounts at H& R Block, it is not H &R Block that is actually offering that return. It's "Sophie," but with a white label as a "Sophie" product.

What is your opinion of this type of product? Because I believe this is an area where many investors think it is a large growth market. But if you look at the results recently, you'll find that they really struggled to turn this into a business that could be meaningfully scaled.

It is to their credit that no one else has succeeded in that. There are many companies that offer these services , and I think that's the problem. This whole trend towards " banking as a service" (BaaS) is there, and more companies want these platforms, but the platforms have not proven to be sustainable.

So, yes, they really couldn't move forward with this in the way they had hoped . And no one else was able to do that either. What distinguishes SoFi is that much of this investment is also directed towards their own products .

If I were a third-party technology company trying to sell this, I would be ruined because I cannot make a profit margin here, and I face the same problems. At least, similar to the way Amazon built " Amazon Web Services" (AWS), we need this infrastructure anyway.

Let's see if we can turn expenses into revenue by selling our excess capacity. Sophie can do almost the same thing, making it a less bad trade for them.

But, look, at the sector level as a whole, there have been many companies that have tried to provide these platforms to non-banks or to lean banking business models. No one has really been able to achieve profit margins here, because there are too many competitors in the market.

Yes, one of the areas they have been trying to do this in recently is commercial banking. Therefore, they have some commercial banking products through what was formerly known as the " Galileo" platform.

This is what the activity of the technology platform represents. And "Sophie" is one of the customers there now.

So, it's funny that they describe it as an announcement of the launch of this service, when it originally came from " Galileo". It's just a part of "Sophie," but that's what you're talking about.

Hey, we're building these services anyway, so it's better for us to offer them under a white-label brand to other fintech companies.

Well, the other part of the business, which has been the main driver of growth over the past few years, is what they call financial services. So, this would be a kind of fee-based business.

List the activities of the loan platform. Autumn already falls under this category , so the small fees they receive , in addition to credit card fees , will make up a significant portion of this.

Is this the kind of business that can continue to grow profitably? And perhaps, as you know , attracting customers to your credit card, and getting them to use your digital app more than you might use something like Wells Fargo, will be enough to increase fees and revenue for Sofy.

Yes, lending through warehouses doesn't really interest me. I think the reason they do that is because of their ability to grow so quickly. So, yes, it's great that they can do that .

They can reduce the portfolio's leverage by selling it and receiving a fee. I think this is good. I don't think this is a growth-based business.

There are many people who do this, just get loans and sell them. It's a good job, but again, we know how to evaluate that. However, the opportunity here lies in those other things, whether it be exchange fees, asset management fees, or even referral fees.

We have said that they have focused on growth at the expense of profitability, perhaps because of how they price their products, but also because of cross-selling. While they are now looking to cross-selling and can increase asset management fees when someone takes out a personal loan or something like that, this is the " balancing wheel". I think this is a real opportunity.

Again, everyone does it. So, I think we should , you know, limit ourselves. I don't think it will look like the growth curve that Meta Platforms enjoyed or anything like that .

But yes, I think there is a real opportunity for them to act more like most of their peers in the banking sector, and to figure out how to cross-sell , and how to leverage existing customers rather than paying huge sums to attract new ones.

I think this is cause for optimism regarding the work. Good. We have explained how the company operates and how it generates profits. What is the optimistic outlook, if you had to define it, for Sofia stock?

Well, I think the optimistic thing is first, look, they are a full-fledged bank with a banking license. This allows them to collect low- cost consumer deposits, which they can then use for lending.

And again, this is how banks make money . You bring in cash, pay a certain rate for it, then take it out in the form of loans, charge a higher rate, and profit from the difference.

They have the ability to do that. This is not exceptional.

They have cost advantages because they do not have branches, but they also have disadvantages; Many of the most profitable clients prefer branches, and many high-yield loans require branches to deal with those small businesses.

Therefore, they can compete here and achieve a good profit margin, especially compared to their non-bank counterparts who do not have a banking license or low-cost deposits.

Nations, they have this growing ring. Again, I think the strongest argument for optimism from here is cross-selling. They have 15 million members. Conducting registration processes for new products.

I believe that about half of the new product sign-ups currently come from their existing base. This should reduce customer acquisition costs and make them a better and more profitable company .

You can also increase the customer's long-term value during construction, and I think there is a strong argument here for this to be a fast-growing bank.

I think they are starting to mature towards that instead of just trying to attract as many customers as possible.

Yes, and if I had to make a case for optimism, I think the simplest way to say it is that this is one of the companies that is genuinely and fundamentally committed to digitization .

This gives you a key advantage, especially when looking at the younger generation who will be climbing the wealth curve.

They don't talk as much about demographics as a company like Robin Hood does, but I think it's similar; If you are of retirement age, have savings of $3 million and are trying to figure out your budget, that is a different matter.

These are the people who will want to go to a physical bank, and will not be used to dealing entirely digitally. But if you're just starting out , say you've just graduated from university and are looking for a place to open your first bank account, Wells Fargo might not be very appealing.

Perhaps " SoFi" is a better option. It may be one of three or four options available to you on the digital side.

Therefore, I believe this will provide them with a strong boost in the long run . I just think that the operational leverage resulting from the lack of branches, and the shift to a world where branches are gradually becoming less important, will work in their favor.

I understand that it is a particular task for small businesses that need to interact with someone, contact them when they encounter a problem, etc. But I think these things will eventually seem like outdated things .

So, this is a company built for the future, and I like it as a company as long as you pay the right price. We will talk about that price in a little while.

What is the negative ( pessimistic) view towards the company " Sofy"? They rely heavily on personal loans, and this represents an unsecured consumer credit risk . I think they are doing a good job in this regard, but I think we should point that out.

The technology platform, again, I think if you look at it as a kind of funding for their capital expenditures, it looks better. But as for the technical platform, I simply don't believe in it as a cornerstone of the optimistic viewpoint.

I think we should include it within the negative viewpoint.

I do n't think they will ever find business-to-business ( B2B) revenues as attractive as they had hoped. Also, this is somehow related to the risks of unsecured credit , but in reality they are exposed to significant risks.

I would argue that they are more vulnerable than most banks to changes in macroeconomic conditions, solely because of the nature of their loan portfolio.

They are working to change that, and as their mortgage and similar businesses grow, this should change over time. But at the moment, they are more vulnerable than most banks to difficult macroeconomic conditions . That's simply the nature of their work.

And look, many of their advantages could turn against them in a wrong scenario. Because they grew thanks to pricing power. They have grown because their personal loans are a better deal than credit cards.

But that credit card was a better deal for the consumer because they were charging lower fees. If defaults increase, that extra margin earned by credit cards will be beneficial.

I'm not predicting that. I don't expect a contraction, but you have to realize again that the trade-off they made is that we will grow. We will use pricing power for growth, and this power may hurt you if you are a low-cost provider of unsecured personal loans , because you have a much smaller margin to counter the risk of default.

Yes, the only thing I would add is that I completely agree with what you say about the technology and the platform's operations. That was something that, when I first looked at the company , I said: Oh, I think this might be a differentiating factor for them.

But this has not proven true over the past few years, and if it had , I think it would have happened by now. So , I kind of agree.

When I look at the stock, I put that activity aside and look at what's happening in lending, what's happening in financial services, and whether more customers are joining the system.

Okay, the most important question. I want to know if SoFi stock is a good buy today ? I'll give you a few measurements in a moment. I also want to know if that's not the case, what price would be a good buy?

Today, we have a price-to- earnings ratio of about 35. On a forward basis, it's about 22. The price-to- book ratio, and here's your banking metric, is about 1.9.

correct. And here lies the difficulty, because I truly believe that SoFi deserves a premium compared to other banks, okay? I believe you should reward growth, but at what cost?

As she says, the future price-to-earnings ratio is approaching 30. That's three times that of Truist Financial, a boring bank with less growth, but a good bank that's not going anywhere anytime soon.

I don't know if I can justify a three- fold price premium for growth that I believe will slow down over time. They won't become like Truist, but they are moving towards a Truist model faster than Truist is moving towards SoFi.

So, at what multiple does this make sense? I think it's less than three times that.

Axos Financial, which I consider a lower-quality digital bank than Sofi, is still trading at a very large discount compared to Sofi.

I think there is a strong argument once again that Sophie deserves a price premium that surpasses all those companies. But I think the current premium is too high to make the stock a buy option.

At what price is it reasonable? Maybe if I halved this rating , I don't know. Even if it drops by half, it will still be ahead of "Troist". I believe that a valuation at half the current price is worth the premium due to the growth potential, but the price would have to fall significantly from its current levels.

I will not sell it now because I believe they can continue, but I am more inclined to sell than to buy, and I currently consider the stock a hold-up option. If I were sitting on large gains, if I bought at the right time, I don't know if I think they have to grow to match that valuation.

I don't think the multiplier will expand any further than here.

Okay, I'm going to take a more optimistic view of "Sophie", and I want to put that in simple context because that's how I build my investment portfolio as well. I think this falls into a good basket of companies that will be the future of finance.

Companies like "Sophie" and "Robin Hood" , and you can put "Nu" in the same category.

I think this is where SoFi has a real long-term opportunity.

Anthony Noto has done a really good job of selling shares when the share price is high and then using that capital to help fund future growth. So, I think if you put all of that together, it's a reasonable price today.

I don't think it's an unmissable buying opportunity today. If we get a discount of 15, 20 or 30% from where we are today, I will be more interested in buying in large quantities.

However, I think starting to build a financial center today is definitely a good price for SoFi. So, I'd put it in the buy category, not a very strong buy yet, but definitely one I'd like to add more of to my portfolio.