Priority Says Businesses Seek Payments, Banking on Single Platform

Priority Technology Holdings is seeing widespread demand for its suite of services that include both software-as-a-service (SaaS) payments and banking.

The company recorded strong performance in each of its three business segments, Tom Priore, chairman and CEO of Priority Technology Holdings, said Thursday (May 9) during the company’s quarterly earnings call.

“Maintaining the momentum we established throughout 2023, we delivered solid results in SMB acquiring, B2B payables and enterprise payments in the first quarter,” Priore said during the call. “Our unified commerce vision continued to resonate with our customers, combining payments and banking functionality in a single platform, accelerated by the strength of our diverse business lines that we’re positioned to benefit from higher interest rates and to perform in a variety of macroeconomic environments, including the one we’re experiencing today.”

In the company’s small to mid-sized business (SMB) acquiring solutions business segment, Priority’s first quarter revenue was 7% lower than it was during the same quarter a year earlier, according to a presentation released in conjunction with the call.

The firm attributed the drop to a single large reseller, saying that excluding that reseller, its revenue would have been up 8%. Sequentially, compared to the previous quarter, the SMB business segment’s revenue was up 3%.

“As discussed on prior calls, a large reseller partner started to diversify their processing activity in Q2 of 2023 and that effort was concluded in Q4,” Priority Chief Financial Officer Tim O’Leary said during the call.

In the B2B business segment, Priority saw its revenue leap 658% year over year (YoY), driven by both its Plastiq and CPX offerings. Plastiq joined the company in August 2023.

The company’s third business segment, enterprise, saw a 50% YoY increase in revenue. Priority attributed its growth here in part to increases in Passport program managers, deposit balances and interest rates.

Overall, Priority’s revenue increased 11.2% YoY, climbing from $185 million in the first quarter of 2023 to $205.7 million in the first quarter of 2024, according to the presentation.

Looking ahead, the firm’s full year 2024 guidance forecasts YoY revenue growth of 16% to 18%, according to a Thursday earnings release.

“Our performance illustrates that partners consistently choose the unified commerce applications in acquiring, payables and banking that best fit their businesses to accelerate cash flow and optimize their working capital,” Priore said during the call. “We’re laser focused on the continued innovation of our SaaS payments and banking suite of services and Accelerated Commerce Engine and are eager to meet the evolving needs of our growing portfolio of customer and enterprise partners.”