Strategic Education - Earnings Call - Q2 2025

Executive Summary

• Q2 2025 delivered modest top-line growth with consolidated revenue up 2.9% year over year to $321.5M, while operating margin expanded to 14.2% (15.2% on a constant currency, adjusted basis), supported by outsized strength in Education Technology Services (ETS).
• EPS outperformed Street expectations: adjusted diluted EPS came in at $1.52 versus consensus of ~$1.43; revenue was slightly below consensus ($321.5M vs ~$322.8M). EPS beat was driven by disciplined OpEx and mix shift to ETS, which posted 50% YoY revenue and operating income growth. Estimates with * retrieved from S&P Global.
• USHE exhibited mixed dynamics: healthcare portfolio enrollment rose 8% and employer-affiliated reached a new high of 31.8% of enrollment, but unaffiliated enrollment remained a headwind; ANZ revenue declined on regulatory pressure to international enrollments, partially offset by domestic strength.
• Capital allocation remains active: quarterly dividend of $0.60/share and $28M in Q2 buybacks ($60M YTD), with ~$169M remaining under the repurchase authorization through year-end.
• Near-term stock catalysts: ETS scaling (Sophia +40% revenue to $16.4M; Workforce Edge now at 80 corporate agreements) and potential policy tailwinds from the employer tuition assistance cap increase mentioned on the call; watch for ANZ regulatory normalization and domestic marketing ramp.

What Went Well and What Went Wrong

What Went Well

• ETS momentum and mix shift: “ETS revenue and operating income both increased 50%… to $37 million and $15 million, respectively,” with stable ~41% operating margin despite investment; Sophia subscribers and revenue grew ~40% YoY; Workforce Edge at 80 corporate partners covering ~3.87M employees.
• Margin execution: Operating margin expanded to 14.2% GAAP and 15.2% adjusted constant currency; adjusted operating income rose to $49.1M (from $43.9M) on disciplined expense growth (~2%).
• USHE healthcare portfolio strength: Total enrollment in healthcare programs rose 8% and now represents 47% of USHE enrollment vs 43% a year ago; employer-affiliated share hit 31.8% (new high) as corporate partnerships deepen.

What Went Wrong

• USHE unaffiliated softness at Strayer: Management flagged ongoing pressure in unaffiliated undergraduate enrollment at Strayer, though “the rate of decline was slightly better in Q2 than Q1,” leaving total USHE enrollment down 0.8% YoY.
• ANZ regulatory headwinds: International enrollment declines (indicative caps and visa velocity constraints) weighed on ANZ revenue (-2.8% YoY), though domestic growth is improving; management expects to lap declines early 2026.
• Top-line vs consensus: Revenue was modestly below the Street in Q2 ($321.5M actual vs ~$322.8M consensus*), reflecting USHE enrollment declines and ANZ constraints despite ETS strength. Estimates with * retrieved from S&P Global.

Transcript

Speaker 3

Hello and welcome to Strategic Education Inc.'s second quarter 2025 results conference call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question and answer session. To ask a question during the session, you will need to press star 11 on your telephone. You will then hear an automated message advising your hand has been raised. To withdraw your question, please press star 11 again. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I will now turn the call over to Therese Wilke, Senior Director of Investor Relations for Strategic Education Inc. Ms. Wilke, please go ahead.

Speaker 2

Thank you. Hello everyone and welcome to Strategic Education Inc.'s conference call in which we will discuss second quarter 2025 results. With us today are Robert Silberman, Chairman, Karl McDonnell, President and Chief Executive Officer, and Daniel Jackson, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Following today's remarks, we will open the call for questions. Please note that this call may include forward-looking statements made pursuant to the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. The statements are based on current expectations and are subject to a number of assumptions, uncertainties, and risks that Strategic Education Inc. has identified in today's press release that could cause actual results to differ materially.

Further information about these and other relevant uncertainties may be found in Strategic Education Inc.'s most recent annual report on Form 10-K, the 10-Q to be filed, and other filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission as well as Strategic Education Inc.'s future 8-Ks, 10-Qs, and 10-Ks. Copies of these filings and the full press release are available for viewing on the website at strategiceducation.com. Now I'd like to turn the call over to Karl. Karl, please go ahead.

Speaker 1

Thank you, Therese, and good morning, everyone. We are very pleased with our second quarter and first half 2025 results, which we reported earlier this morning, and in particular with the continued strong performance within our Education Technology Services segment, which I will discuss momentarily. On a constant currency basis, SEI's revenue grew 4% from the prior year. Disciplined expense management limited our operating expense growth to just 2%, resulting in operating income of $49 million, a 12% increase from the prior year. Our operating margin increased 110 basis points to 15.2%. Adjusted earnings per share were $1.54 compared to $1.33 from the prior year, an increase of 16%. Turning now to our segments, we are pleased to see the continued strong performance of our ETS division, which remains on track to become a significant contributor to SEI earnings composition in line with our strategy.

ETS revenue and operating income both increased 50% from the prior year to $37 million and $15 million, respectively. ETS share of SEI's operating income grew from 23% last year to 31% this year, an increase of 8 percentage points. Sophia Learning, our direct-to-consumer portal that offers high-quality college-level courses and increasingly serves as a key component of many of our key strategic corporate partnerships, grew both average and total subscribers and revenue by 40%. Driven by strong growth in both consumer and employer-affiliated subscribers, Workforce Edge continues to perform exceptionally well and now has 80 total corporate partnerships collectively employing more than 3.8 million employees. Notwithstanding our continued strong investment in ETS, which included a 50% increase in their expenses, ETS's operating margin remained stable on a year-over-year basis at 41%. U.S. higher education total enrollment decreased by 1% from the prior year.

However, slightly higher revenue per student helped offset approximately half of the enrollment decline, resulting in revenue being down year over year by half of 1%. Employer-affiliated enrollment once again remained strong, increasing by 8% from the prior year and now represents 32% of all U.S. higher education enrollment, again in line with our strategy. In addition to the strength of our employer-affiliated enrollment, U.S. Higher Education's healthcare portfolio, which represents half of all enrollments, also increased its total enrollment by 8% from the prior year. U.S. Higher education operating expenses decreased by $2 million from the prior year, or a reduction of 1%. As a result, U.S. higher education operating income increased 5% from the prior year, and its operating margin increased 40 basis points.

Turning now to our Australia/New Zealand segment, ANZ second quarter total enrollment decreased 3% from the prior year, driven by the continued regulatory restrictions on international student enrollment. Using constant currency, revenue increased slightly to $71 million, and operating income decreased from $14 million in the prior year to $13 million this year. Notwithstanding the recent decline in our international enrollment, we are optimistic about our pivot to focusing primarily on the Australian domestic market, where we have seen mid to high single digit new student growth through the first half of this year. Finally, regarding capital allocation, in addition to our regular quarterly dividend, we repurchased approximately 325,000 shares during the quarter for a total of $28 million this year. To date, we have repurchased just under 720,000 shares for $60 million, leaving us with $169 million remaining on our share repurchase authorization through the end of this year.

Finally, as always, I'd like to take this opportunity to thank all of my colleagues here at SEI for their ongoing commitment and support to our students and employer partners. With that, Andrew, we'd be happy to take questions.

Speaker 3

Certainly. As a reminder to ask a question, please press star 11 on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. To withdraw your question, please press star 11 again. Our first question comes from the line of Alexander Paris with Barrington Research Associates Inc.

Speaker 0

Hi guys. Thanks for taking my question and congrats on the strong earnings. Just a couple of clarifying questions on your prepared comments, starting with U.S. Higher Education. You noted in the press release the success with employer-affiliated enrollment and the healthcare portfolio. You mentioned the decline in unemployment, unaffiliated enrollment. I wonder if we can get a little bit more information there. I think you said on the Q1 call, unaffiliated enrollment was down 2.7% year over year to 60,444.

Speaker 1

I wonder if you can get.

Speaker 0

Comparable numbers for the second quarter or the first half, and then what's the outlook for the second half? Because as I recall, the comps get a little easier in the second half.

Speaker 1

Good morning, Alexander. The declines in new student enrollment, by the way, I don't have the exact number in front of me, but I can tell you that the softness that we're seeing in new student enrollment is primarily at Strayer University. It's primarily in our unaffiliated students, students that don't come from a corporate partnership. I believe the rate of decline was slightly better in the second quarter than it was in the first quarter. Maybe Daniel afterwards can follow up with you on the exact numbers.

Speaker 0

Yeah, no, that's great. We have a follow up cost schedule.

Speaker 4

And then.

Speaker 0

On the ANZ side, again, not surprising. On the lower enrollment internationally, you said that there's progress on the domestic side. I'm wondering what the split is between the two now, and is domestic up as a percentage of the total from the beginning of the year, for example. Anyway, a little more color there would be great. Sure.

Speaker 1

Historically, as we've said, the split between domestic and international was always roughly 50/50. We've seen a decline in international, basically in line with the indicative caps that the Australian government imposed. As I said, we have seen growth in domestic, so the composition is skewing now to more domestic. We're going to anniversary these declines in international enrollment sometime early in 2026. At that point, we would expect Torrens to return to both new student growth and total enrollment growth, given the success that we've seen in the domestic market. I would just add that I would say we're still not fully funded from a marketing standpoint in the domestic market. We're planning to increase marketing investments in the back half of this year. Based on the performance of the domestic market, that will kind of set what our intention is for 2026.

We have every expectation that Australia/New Zealand will be growing once we anniversary these declines due to the Australian restrictions on international enrollment.

Speaker 0

Great. Last question. Anna can follow up with the team after this call on some of the other particulars, but just wondering what your thoughts are about legislative and regulatory with the One Big Beautiful Bill passed and its implications for higher education, as well as other regulatory moves like on the 90/10 side and so on.

Speaker 1

Yeah, so obviously we're still digesting everything that was in One Big Beautiful Bill. My understanding is that many of the components were left to the department to figure out how to implement, which my understanding is they intend to do via a couple of negotiated rulemaking sessions. Those will clearly be important for us to follow. Any impact. Based on everything that we've seen now, we don't expect any material adverse impact from anything in One Big Beautiful Bill. Great.

Speaker 0

That's what I thought. Thank you. I'll get back in the queue unless somebody else has questions.

Speaker 3

Once again, to ask a question, please press star 11 on your telephone. Our next question comes from the line of Jasper Bibb with Truist Securities Inc.

Speaker 4

Hey, good morning everyone. Hope you could talk a little bit more about where you're seeing weakness at Strayer and to the extent you can, maybe you could frame how your leading indicators like inquiry volumes are trending and any expectations for what enrollment might look like for us in the U.S.

Speaker 3

Back half of the year. Thanks.

Speaker 4

Sure.

Speaker 1

This is the cycle that we're in, and seeing where we have some pressure on our unaffiliated undergraduate students, again, primarily at Strayer University, is a cycle that we've seen and been through before. There is some natural variability to enrollment in terms of leading indicators. I don't have that in front of me, Jasper, but we have every expectation that over the long term enrollment will normalize, as we've always said, kind of in the mid single digit range. Our expectation hasn't changed there. For this year, I'd say we're kind of right on track with what we laid out at Investor Day, and that's still the trajectory that we're planning for in 2025.

Speaker 4

Maybe following up on that last comment, do you still, I guess, expect where you'll be at in 2025 from a revenue and profit growth perspective to align with the notional model that you outlined at the investor day, I guess a year and a half, two years ago now.

Speaker 1

Yep.

Speaker 3

Yes.

Speaker 1

Okay.

Speaker 4

On the ETS front, you know, really strong growth there. I was just hoping you could kind of update us on the large employer partnership you've talked about the last couple of calls, how that's ramping and then maybe the progression of that and then the implications for revenue in the back half of the year as I guess more probably employees from that relationship migrate onto the platform.

Speaker 1

Yeah, I'd say we're in the midst of that onboarding.

Speaker 0

So far.

Speaker 1

I would say our team has done a great job. My understanding is this particular client is very pleased with the work that the Workforce Edge team has done. We've seen significant revenue growth specifically from that partner because we haven't anniversary that we didn't have it last year. That will continue through the back half of this year. All things considered, I'd say that particular relationship has gone as well as it possibly could.

Speaker 3

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Jeffrey Silber with BMO Capital Markets.

Speaker 4

Thanks so much. Just a couple quick follow ups from the other questions. First on Australia/New Zealand, can you just remind us what the international caps are, and are they impacted in terms of transfer students at other universities? I know you talked about that before.

Speaker 1

Yes, good morning, Jeff. By the way, the caps themselves were intended to restrict what we refer to as offshore international enrollment. These are students who are not in Australia who need a visa to immigrate in for the purposes of study. Those reductions for us represented about a 30% reduction from pre-cap levels. The Australian government, in addition to that cap, which, by the way, they're enforcing not with legislation, but through the velocity, if you will, of visa approvals, has also put some restrictions in on onshore people who are already in Australia, students' ability to transfer to other institutions, which historically, frankly, was the primary source of international enrollments for Torrens, at least in the last couple of years.

We have seen a decline in both. We have seen a decline on a year-over-year basis on offshore students immigrating in, and we have also seen a decline in onshore students transferring. As I said just a few moments ago, we do expect to lap those declines early next year. At that point, we expect to see a return to both new and total enrollment growth. I'd have to say the domestic growth that we've seen, it's early, but it's been a little stronger than, frankly, I was anticipating it would be at this point, just given that Torrens is so young in the Australian higher ed ecosystem and we haven't fully funded a domestic marketing budget even since we've taken over the asset. That is something that we intend to do in the back half of this year and heading into 2026.

Speaker 4

Okay, that's really helpful. Appreciate that. Just one big follow up from the One Big Beautiful Bill question. Was there anything in there that might be a positive to you? I know this is minor, but it looks like they're going to be increasing the cap on the employer tuition assistance program. I know it's small, but would that be something that might be a needle mover for you?

Speaker 1

Definitely. It's the first increase in that number that I can remember since I've been here in 20 years. The fact that that can be indexed to inflation I think is a net positive to the extent that we expand the portfolio in the U.S. to include some more workforce related programs. There's also a chance that the workforce Pell inclusion could be beneficial. Yes, definitely on the cap on the $5,250 taxable limit. Okay.

Speaker 4

Really appreciate the caller. Thanks so much.

Speaker 1

Thanks Jeff.

Speaker 3

Thank you. I'm showing no further questions. With that, I'll hand the call back over to CEO Karl McDonnell for any closing remarks.

Speaker 1

Thank you everyone for joining us today, and we look forward to discussing our Q3 results in three months.

Speaker 3

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for participating. This does conclude today's program, and you may now disconnect.