SoFi lifts revenue outlook, sets 90-cent 2027 goal; earnings outlook held

SoFi sells loans, bank accounts, cards and investing through one app, and it reports three business lines: Lending, Technology Platform and Financial Services.¹ It became a bank holding company in February 2022, so the Federal Reserve regulates it, and customer deposits now pay for most of its lending.² Deposits reached $51.3 billion at September 30, up from $37.5 billion at the end of 2025.³

The Technology Platform sells account software to other banks and fintech firms, and it lost a large client in 2025 that still weighs on its year-over-year numbers.¹ SoFi counts anyone who ever joined as a member unless they are removed, so 17.1 million is a running total rather than a count of active users.²

The stock has had a hard 2026. On March 17, 2026, the short seller Muddy Waters published a report questioning SoFi's loan accounting, fair value marks and charge-off reporting.¹ SoFi called the report inaccurate and misleading and said it would explore legal action.²

Shares fell more than 13% during trading on April 29, 2026, the day SoFi reported first-quarter results.¹ A plaintiffs' law firm then opened an investigation, but it had only said it may file a suit.² SoFi sold new stock at $20.85 a share in July 2025 and at $27.50 in December 2025.³

In our price data the stock closed at $17.165 on September 22, 2026, and at $14.615 on October 23, the last close before this release.¹ In July, SoFi had raised its 2026 adjusted revenue target to $4.75 billion to $4.85 billion.² Before this release, analysts polled by FactSet expected $4.87 billion of 2026 revenue and $0.60 of adjusted earnings per share.³

The third quarter was SoFi's largest yet. Reported revenue rose 44% to $1.39 billion, and net income rose 73% to $241.0 million, or $0.18 a diluted share.¹ Adjusted revenue, which removes fair value changes in servicing rights and some similar items, rose 44% to $1.37 billion.² SoFi added a record 1.2 million members, and loan originations rose 71% to a record $16.9 billion.³

Fees, rather than interest, made up about $570.6 million, or 42% of revenue.¹ Net interest margin, the gap between what SoFi earns on loans and pays for funds, rose 16 basis points from the second quarter to 6.14%.² Of new products opened in the quarter, 51% came from existing members.³

For all of 2026, management now expects about $5.04 billion of adjusted revenue, 40% more than in 2025.¹ It expects about $1.66 billion of adjusted EBITDA, a 33% margin. That measure adds back items such as depreciation of $81.3 million, stock pay of $70.9 million and interest on corporate borrowings in the third quarter, so it runs well above net income.² Management also continues to expect about $840 million of adjusted net income and $0.61 of adjusted earnings per share for 2026, so the earnings targets did not rise with revenue.³

The math on the last quarter matters. Through September, SoFi booked $3.66 billion of adjusted revenue.¹ That leaves about $1.38 billion to reach the full-year target of $5.04 billion.² A fourth quarter of that size would be roughly level with the third quarter's $1.37 billion.³

It would still be about 36% more than the $1.013 billion of the fourth quarter of 2025.

The profit targets point the other way. Adjusted net income was $570.1 million through September.¹ The gap to the full-year target of $840 million is about $270 million.² That is more than the $243.0 million earned in the third quarter.³

Adjusted EBITDA was $1.17 billion through September, against a full-year target of $1.66 billion.¹ The gap, about $492 million, is more than the third quarter's $469.8 million.² Per share, the full-year target is $0.61.³

Through September SoFi earned $0.43 of adjusted earnings per share, and the third quarter alone earned $0.18.¹ That leaves $0.18 of the $0.61 full-year target for the last quarter, so the per-share target implies only level profit per share, while the $840 million net income target implies a wider margin on flat revenue, and the two do not quite agree.²

For 2027, management's goals are about $6.4 billion of adjusted revenue, which would be 27% growth, and about $2.24 billion of adjusted EBITDA, a 35% margin.¹ It also expects about $1.28 billion of adjusted net income, a 20% margin, and about $0.90 of adjusted earnings per share.² That net income goal is about 52% more than the $840 million expected for 2026.³

These are targets, not results, and management says it has not reconciled its forward-looking adjusted measures to the reported figures.¹ Its longer goal is 100 million products and five businesses each above $1 billion of revenue by 2030.²

On the quality of earnings, reported and adjusted profit were close in the third quarter: $241.0 million of net income against $243.0 million adjusted.¹ Income tax expense jumped to $76.8 million from $9.2 million a year earlier, so pre-tax profit grew faster than net income.² The bigger question is loan values. SoFi measures its personal, student and home loans at fair value, an estimate of what they would sell for, and falling marks are recognized as fair value losses.³

The premium of those loans over their unpaid principal fell from about $2.03 billion at June 30 to $1.40 billion at September 30, a drop of about $628 million.¹ The release ties a higher personal-loan discount rate mainly to a 76 basis point rise in benchmark rates, and it raised its personal-loan default assumption to 5.10% from 4.77%.² Part of the drop may also reflect loans sold or transferred, which topped $5.3 billion in the quarter.³

SoFi hedges rate moves with interest-rate swaps. In the first half of 2026, $503.7 million of loan markdowns were set against $577.6 million of swap gains. The third-quarter swap result is listed below as unknown.

Credit looks steady on the reported rate and weaker on the full picture. The personal loan charge-off rate, the share of loans written off, fell to 2.26%, but that rate is lowered by sales of delinquent loans.¹ Without those sales, the company estimates the rate would have been about 3.4%.² Credit card charge-offs rose to 7.77% from 6.55%, on a small book of about $510 million, and management says its data still supports a 7-8% maximum lifetime loss on personal loans.³

Lending did the heavy lifting, with reported segment revenue up 66% to $821.3 million.¹ Financial Services, the bank account, card and investing side, earned $261.0 million of contribution profit, but its margin fell 4 points to 50%, and its annualized revenue per product fell 13% to $90 from $104 a year earlier, though it rose from $88 in the second quarter.² Technology Platform revenue was $87.4 million, down 24% from a year earlier, and sales and marketing spending rose to $444.0 million from $286.9 million.³

The balance sheet grew fast. Cash fell to $2.81 billion from $4.93 billion at the end of 2025, while debt rose to $3.86 billion from $1.82 billion, so debt now exceeds cash by about $1.05 billion.¹ That gap is small next to the $1.17 billion of adjusted EBITDA earned through September. The third quarter's $10.8 million of corporate borrowing interest was covered about 43 times by that quarter's adjusted EBITDA.²

Operating cash flow is a poor gauge here, because SoFi counts loans it makes to sell as operating cash. It used $6.21 billion of operating cash in the first half of 2026 as the loan book grew.¹ The nearest debt payment was $428.0 million of convertible notes due October 15, 2026, after the quarter closed, and their conversion price of about $22.41 was well above the share price.² At June 30 SoFi reported $13.68 billion of remaining liquidity, counting $3.13 billion of cash as well as undrawn warehouse and credit lines; it met all its debt covenants and expected its liquidity to cover at least the next 12 months.³

For a bank, capital is the better test. SoFi's estimated core capital ratio, common equity against risk-weighted assets, fell to 16.9% at September 30 from 18.7% at June 30 and 22.8% at the end of 2025.¹ That is a drop of 5.9 points since the end of 2025, though the ratio is still well above the 7.0% minimum shown in the release, and its tier 1 leverage ratio was 15.0% against a 4.0% minimum.² Risk-weighted assets grew to $56.2 billion from $33.5 billion a year earlier, so fast loan growth uses up capital.³

Equity rose $218.9 million in the quarter to $11.3 billion, or $8.71 a share, and tangible book value was $7.48 a share, up 25% in a year.

Shares outstanding rose to 1.297 billion from 1.205 billion a year earlier, about 7.6% more, including 54.5 million shares sold in December 2025.¹ The largest overhang is $862.5 million of 2029 convertible notes that convert at about $9.45 a share; SoFi pays the principal in cash and issues shares only for the value above it, so at $16.005 a full conversion would cost about $862.5 million of cash and roughly 37 million new shares before the capped calls.² SoFi bought capped calls to offset that dilution, but the 2029 protection is capped at $14.54 a share, so above that price shareholders bear more of it.³

Adjusted earnings per share leave out 26.4 million shares of note dilution in the quarter, while diluted shares in the reported figure averaged 1.358 billion.¹ Employees also held 45.5 million restricted stock units and 13.4 million options at June 30, about 4.5% of today's share count.²

The insider filings since the 10-Q show sales and tax withholding. Chief technology officer Jeremy Rishel, who adopted a trading plan, sold 18,624 shares at $17.50 in September.¹ Executive Kelli Keough sold 10,203 shares at about $14.72 in October, and chief executive Anthony Noto had 188,259 shares withheld for tax at $17.32 when stock awards vested.²

At $16.005, SoFi trades at about 18 times the 2027 goal of $0.90 a share, about 26 times the 2026 target of $0.61 and about 2.1 times tangible book value per share.¹ The price is still below the $20.85 and $27.50 at which SoFi sold stock in 2025. Our price data start in mid-September, so we cannot confirm the high or low of the past year.²

The bull case is that SoFi grows revenue about 40% a year while staying profitable, and now points to 27% more in 2027 with a wider 35% margin.¹ Deposits fund most of its loans, and the company estimates that saves about $745.0 million a year in interest compared with warehouse credit lines.² At about 18 times the 2027 goal, buyers pay far less than investors paid in the $27.50 offering, and the stock price already fell through the autumn.³

The bear case, strongest first, starts with the flat fourth quarter: the new revenue target implies no growth from the third quarter, and the 2026 earnings target did not rise.¹ Next come the loan marks, the same area the short seller attacked: a $628 million shrink in the loan premium in one quarter, with the hedge result not yet public.² Then capital: the core ratio lost 5.9 points since the end of 2025, credit card losses rose, and above $14.54 a share the 2029 notes dilute holders with less offset.³

What would prove the bulls wrong is a fourth quarter well short of about $1.38 billion of adjusted revenue, a cut to the $0.61 target, or a core capital ratio that keeps falling.¹ The third-quarter 10-Q, expected in early November, should add the swap results and covenant status. A customer class action against SoFi Securities, served in June 2026, is also pending, and a replay of the results webcast stays online for 30 days.²

SoFi held its results webcast at 8 a.m. Eastern on October 27, 2026, and we found no transcript of it, so analysts' questions on the flat fourth quarter and the 2027 margins are not covered here.

The 10-Q showed $428.0 million of 2026 convertible notes due on October 15, 2026, and the results release covers only the period to September 30, so how SoFi paid them is not yet shown.

Management has not reconciled its forward-looking adjusted measures to reported figures, so the reported net income behind the $0.90 goal is not known.

In the first half, swap gains of $577.6 million more than covered $503.7 million of loan markdowns, but the third-quarter swap figure is not in the release.

The 2029 notes could be converted from July 1 to September 30, 2026, and no holder had converted through August 6, 2026, so conversions after that date are not yet reported.