Meta Financial Group Inc.’s profit fell by almost 40% in its fiscal first quarter after taking a goodwill charge stemming from its poor stock performance.
The Storm Lakes, Iowa-based company’s shares are down more than 50% since mid-October, when it reported that the Office of Thrift Supervision ordered it shut down a low-dollar, high-interest loan program it offered to users of prepaid debit cards for engaging in “unfair or deceptive acts or practices” (
Meta, which offers retail-banking services directly to consumers and offers card-issuing services to other banks, said it wrote down the value of its goodwill by $1.5 million mostly because of the recent decline in its stock price. Meta on Feb. 7 reported net income of $721,000for the quarter ended Dec. 31, down 39.4% from $1.19 million during the same period a year earlier.
The company last month said the regulator notified it that it is preparing a cease-and-desist order to present to the company and is determining whether to assess civil monetary penalties against Meta’s MetaBank subsidiary, one of the biggest issuers of prepaid debit cards (
Meta’s revenue for the quarter dropped 19.9%, to $24.9 million from $31.1 million, driven mostly by a drop in fee revenue from the discontinuance of its iAdvance loan program.
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