Rent-A-Center, Inc. Announces Management Change for Acima and Reaffirms 2022 Guidance

Rhea-AI Summary

Rent-A-Center, Inc. (NASDAQ: RCII) announced that Aaron Allred, the founder of Acima, has been appointed Executive Vice President of Acima effective March 28, 2022. Allred, a significant shareholder, will manage all Acima operations and report to CEO Mitch Fadel. Additionally, the company reaffirms its consolidated guidance for Q1 and full year 2022, projecting revenues of $4.45 to $4.6 billion and an Adjusted EBITDA between $515 million and $565 million. Non-GAAP diluted earnings per share are estimated to be $4.50 to $5.00 for the full year.

Positive

• Aaron Allred appointed as Executive Vice President of Acima, indicating strong leadership continuity.
• Affirmation of full-year financial guidance with projected revenues between $4.45 billion and $4.6 billion.
• Expected Adjusted EBITDA of $515 million to $565 million suggests solid operational performance.

Negative

• Jason Hogg's departure from the company may indicate potential instability in leadership.

PLANO, Texas--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- Rent-A-Center, Inc. (NASDAQ/NGS:RCII), a leading provider of technology driven and flexible leasing solutions for consumers, today announced that as of March 28, 2022 Aaron Allred has assumed the role of Executive Vice President, Acima. Mr. Allred is the founder of Acima, has continued to work for the Company in an advisory role since the Acima acquisition closed in February 2021, and is a significant shareholder. Moving forward Mr. Allred will oversee all aspects of the Acima business and report to Mitch Fadel, Chief Executive Officer of Rent-A-Center, Inc. Jason Hogg, former Executive Vice President, Acima, has departed the Company.

In addition to the management change at Acima, the Company is reaffirming the following consolidated guidance for the first quarter and full year of 2022, as previously reported on February 23, 2022:

2022 Guidance				Full Year 2022				First Quarter 2022
Consolidated (1)
Revenues ($'s billion)				$4.450 - $4.600				$1.125 - $1.155
Adjusted EBITDA (2)(4) ($'s million)				$515 - $565				$85 - $100
Non-GAAP Diluted earnings per share (2)(3)				$4.50 - $5.00				$0.65 - $0.80
Free cash flow (2) ($'s million)				$390 - $440				N/A

(1)	Consolidated includes Acima, Rent-A-Center Business, Franchising, Mexico and Corporate Segments.
(2)	Non-GAAP financial measure. See descriptions below in this release. Because of the inherent uncertainty related to the special items identified in the tables below, management does not believe it is able to provide a meaningful forecast of the comparable GAAP measures or reconciliation to any forecasted GAAP measure without unreasonable effort. Adjusted EBITDA figures now exclude stock based compensation.
(3)	Non-GAAP diluted earnings per share excludes the impact of incremental depreciation and amortization related to the estimated fair value of acquired Acima assets, stock compensation expense associated with the Acima acquisition equity consideration subject to vesting conditions, and one-time transaction and integration costs related to the Acima acquisition. Guidance excludes the impact of future share repurchases.
(4)	The Company has modified its definition of Adjusted EBITDA beginning with first quarter 2022 results to exclude stock-based compensation.

About Rent-A-Center, Inc.

Rent-A-Center, Inc. (NASDAQ: RCII) is a leading provider of technology driven, flexible, no debt obligation leasing solutions that offer underserved consumers access to and potential ownership of high-quality durable goods that enhance the quality of life. The Company’s omni-channel model utilizes proprietary data and technology to facilitate transactions across a wide range of retail channels including its own Acima virtual lease-to-own platform, Rentacenter.com, e-commerce partner platforms, partner retail stores, and Rent-A-Center branded stores. For additional information about the Company, please visit our website Rentacenter.com or Investor.rentacenter.com.

Forward Looking Statements

This press release contains forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties. These statements are made under the "safe harbor" provisions of the U.S. Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such forward-looking statements generally can be identified by the use of forward-looking terminology such as "may," "will," "expect," "intend," "could," "estimate," "predict," "continue," "maintain," "should," "anticipate," "believe," or “confident,” or the negative thereof or variations thereon or similar terminology and including, among others, statements concerning (i) the Company's guidance for 2022 and future outlook, and (ii) other statements regarding the Company's strategy and plans and other statements that are not historical facts. However, there can be no assurance that such expectations will occur. The Company's actual future performance could differ materially and adversely from such statements. Factors that could cause or contribute to these differences include, but are not limited to: (1) risks relating to the Acima acquisition, including (i) the possibility that the anticipated benefits from the Acima acquisition may not be fully realized or may take longer to realize than expected, (ii) the possibility that costs, difficulties or disruptions related to the integration of Acima Holdings operations into the Company's other operations will be greater than expected, (iii) the Company's ability to (A) effectively adjust to changes in the composition of the Company's offerings and product mix as a result of acquiring Acima Holdings and continue to maintain the quality of existing offerings and (B) successfully introduce other new product or service offerings on a timely and cost-effective basis, and (iv) changes in the Company's future cash requirements as a result of the Acima acquisition, whether caused by unanticipated increases in capital expenditures or working capital needs, unanticipated liabilities or otherwise; (2) the Company's ability to identify potential acquisition candidates, complete acquisitions and successfully integrate acquired companies; (3) the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and related government and regulatory restrictions issued to combat the pandemic, including adverse changes in such restrictions and the expiration of governmental stimulus programs, and impacts on (i) demand for the Company's lease-to-own products offered in the Company's operating segments, (ii) the Company's Acima retail partners, (iii) the Company's customers and their willingness and ability to satisfy their lease obligations, (iv) the Company's suppliers' ability to satisfy its merchandise needs and related supply chain disruptions, (v) the Company's employees, including the ability to adequately staff its operating locations, (vi) the Company's financial and operational performance, and (vii) the Company's liquidity; (4) the general strength of the economy and other economic conditions affecting consumer preferences and spending, including the availability of credit to the Company's target consumers; (5) factors affecting the disposable income available to the Company's current and potential customers; (6) changes in the unemployment rate; (7) capital market conditions, including availability of funding sources for the Company; (8) changes in the Company's credit ratings; (9) difficulties encountered in improving the financial and operational performance of the Company's business segments; (10) risks associated with pricing changes and strategies being deployed in the Company's businesses; (11) the Company's ability to continue to realize benefits from its initiatives regarding cost-savings and other EBITDA enhancements, efficiencies and working capital improvements; (12) the Company's ability to continue to effectively execute its strategic initiatives, including mitigating risks associated with any potential mergers and acquisitions, or re-franchising opportunities; (13) failure to manage the Company's store labor and other store expenses, including merchandise losses; (14) disruptions caused by the operation of the Company's store information management systems or disruptions in the systems of the Company's host retailers; (15) risks related to the Company's virtual lease-to-own business, including the Company's ability to continue to develop and successfully implement the necessary technologies; (16) the Company's ability to achieve the benefits expected from its integrated virtual and staffed retail partner offering and to successfully grow this business segment; (17) exposure to potential operating margin degradation due to the higher cost of merchandise in the Company's Acima offering and higher merchandise losses; (18) the Company's transition to more-readily scalable, “cloud-based” solutions; (19) the Company's ability to develop and successfully implement digital or E-commerce capabilities, including mobile applications; (20) the Company's ability to protect its proprietary intellectual property; (21) disruptions in the Company's supply chain; (22) limitations of, or disruptions in, the Company's distribution network; (23) rapid inflation or deflation in the prices of the Company's products; (24) the Company's ability to execute and the effectiveness of store consolidations, including the Company's ability to retain the revenue from customer accounts merged into another store location as a result of a store consolidation; (25) the Company's available cash flow and its ability to generate sufficient cash flow to continue paying dividends; (26) increased competition from traditional competitors, virtual lease-to-own competitors, online retailers, Buy-Now-Pay-Later and other Fintech companies and other competitors, including subprime lenders; (27) the Company's ability to identify and successfully market products and services that appeal to its current and future targeted customer segments and to accurately estimate the size of the total addressable market; (28) consumer preferences and perceptions of the Company's brands; (29) the Company's ability to retain the revenue associated with acquired customer accounts and enhance the performance of acquired stores; (30) the Company's ability to enter into new, and collect on, its rental or lease purchase agreements; (31) changes in the enforcement of existing laws and regulations and the enactment of new laws and regulations adversely affecting the Company's business, including any legislative or regulatory enforcement efforts that seek to re-characterize store-based or virtual lease-to-own transactions as credit sales and to apply consumer credit laws and regulations to the Company's business; (32) the Company's compliance with applicable statutes or regulations governing its businesses; (33) the impact of any additional social unrest such as that experienced in 2020 or otherwise, and resulting damage to the Company's inventory or other assets and potential lost revenues; (34) changes in interest rates; (35) changes in tariff policies; (36) adverse changes in the economic conditions of the industries, countries or markets that the Company serves; (37) information technology and data security costs; (38) the impact of any breaches in data security or other disturbances to the Company's information technology and other networks and the Company's ability to protect the integrity and security of individually identifiable data of its customers, employees and retail partners; (39) changes in estimates relating to self-insurance liabilities and income tax and litigation reserves; (40) changes in the Company's effective tax rate; (41) fluctuations in foreign currency exchange rates; (42) the Company's ability to maintain an effective system of internal control; (43) litigation or administrative proceedings to which the Company is or may be a party to from time to time; and (44) the other risks detailed from time to time in the Company's SEC reports, including but not limited to, its Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2021 and in its subsequent Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q and Current Reports on Form 8-K. You are cautioned not to place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date of this press release. Except as required by law, the Company is not obligated to publicly release any revisions to these forward-looking statements to reflect the events or circumstances after the date hereof or to reflect the occurrence of unanticipated events.

Non-GAAP Financial Measures

This release contains certain financial information determined by methods other than in accordance with U.S. Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP), including (1) Non-GAAP diluted earnings per share (net earnings, as adjusted for special items (as defined below), net of taxes, divided by the number of shares of our common stock on a fully diluted basis), (2) Adjusted EBITDA (net earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization, as adjusted for special items) on a consolidated and segment basis and (3) Free Cash Flow (net cash provided by operating activities less capital expenditures). “Special items” refers to certain gains and charges we view as extraordinary, unusual or non-recurring in nature and which we believe do not reflect our core business activities. Because of the inherent uncertainty related to the special items, management does not believe it is able to provide a meaningful forecast of the comparable GAAP measures or reconciliation to any forecasted GAAP measure without unreasonable effort.

These non-GAAP measures are additional tools intended to assist our management in comparing our performance on a more consistent basis for purposes of business decision-making by removing the impact of certain items management believes do not directly reflect our core operations. These measures are intended to assist management in evaluating operating performance and liquidity, comparing performance and liquidity across periods, planning and forecasting future business operations, helping determine levels of operating and capital investments and identifying and assessing additional trends potentially impacting our Company that may not be shown solely by comparisons of GAAP measures. Consolidated Adjusted EBITDA is also used as part of our incentive compensation program for our executive officers and others.

We believe these non-GAAP financial measures also provide supplemental information that is useful to investors, analysts and other external users of our consolidated financial statements in understanding our financial results and evaluating our performance and liquidity from period to period. However, non-GAAP financial measures have inherent limitations and are not substitutes for or superior to, and they should be read together with, our consolidated financial statements prepared in accordance with GAAP. Further, because non-GAAP financial measures are not standardized, it may not be possible to compare such measures to the non-GAAP financial measures presented by other companies, even if they have the same or similar names.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20220329005991/en/

Investor Contact:

Rent-A-Center, Inc.

Brendan Metrano

VP, Investor Relations

972-801-1280

brendan.metrano@rentacenter.com

Source: Rent-A-Center, Inc.

FAQ

Who is the new Executive Vice President of Acima at Rent-A-Center, Inc.?

Aaron Allred has been appointed as the Executive Vice President of Acima as of March 28, 2022.

What are the projected revenues for Rent-A-Center, Inc. in 2022?

Rent-A-Center, Inc. projects revenues between $4.45 billion and $4.6 billion for the year 2022.

What are the expected Adjusted EBITDA figures for Rent-A-Center, Inc. for 2022?

The expected Adjusted EBITDA for Rent-A-Center, Inc. is between $515 million and $565 million for 2022.

What is the estimated non-GAAP diluted earnings per share for Rent-A-Center, Inc. in 2022?

Non-GAAP diluted earnings per share for Rent-A-Center, Inc. are estimated to be between $4.50 and $5.00 for 2022.

What leadership change occurred at Rent-A-Center, Inc. recently?

Jason Hogg, the former Executive Vice President of Acima, has left the company, and Aaron Allred has taken over his role.