Why FICO stock is crashing

Melodic_Molasses_736 · 2026-04-10T22:15:31+00:00

=== SUMMARY === - The post analyzes a regulatory change allowing Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to accept VantageScore 4.0, breaking FICO's monopoly on mortgage credit scoring. - The author's thesis is that banks will rationally choose the cheaper VantageScore, pressuring FICO's pricing power and market share, despite FICO's possible technical superiority. - Quality assessment: Well-researched DD. The author demonstrates understanding of the mortgage origination process, GSE rules, and competitive dynamics. === SENTIMENT === MIXED === TRADE IDEAS === FICO - WATCH | confidence: 0.60 | sentiment: +0.30 Speaker: u/Melodic_Molasses_736 Thesis: 1. THE FACT: FHFA approval of VantageScore 4.0 for GSEs creates a cheaper alternative for banks, who are incentivized to use it to cut costs since they sell most loans. 2. THE BRIDGE: FICO faces imminent revenue/margin pressure as it must lower prices or cede share in a core market, causing the stock to crash. 3. THE VERDICT: The long-term threat is significant, but the company is well-run and a potential Fed cutting cycle could boost refinancing volume, providing a counter-cyclical revenue catalyst. 4. RISKS: FICO successfully lobbying to reverse the decision; VantageScore fails to gain traction; a surge in refinancing volume overwhelms the competitive pressure. Timeframe: medium-term Key Points: - VantageScore 4.0 is approved & cheaper - Banks' incentives misaligned with loan quality - FICO may have to cut prices - Refinance boom could offset pressure

AI Summary

Summary

The post analyzes a regulatory change allowing Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to accept VantageScore 4.0, breaking FICO's monopoly on mortgage credit scoring.
The author's thesis is that banks will rationally choose the cheaper VantageScore, pressuring FICO's pricing power and market share, despite FICO's possible technical superiority.
Quality assessment: Well-researched DD. The author demonstrates understanding of the mortgage origination process, GSE rules, and competitive dynamics.

Score 17

Comments 11

Upvote % 100%

▶ Full Post Text

From what i heard, the stock moved down today because in a podcast this morning, the CEO of the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) revealed that the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) is making the VantageScore 4.0 operational for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Now here is my take on the whole thing:

Before Fico was a monopoly. Now you have vantagescore. Fico claimed that while Vantagescore and Classic Fico scoring has similar performance,  their new FICO 10T scoring is much better than vantagescore 4.0 at detecting default loans. Unfortunately, Fannie and Freddie (GSEs) have only approved lenders to use either Vantage4.0 or Classic FICO. Lender can choose.

Now something like 70 percents of loans that are given out by banks are in turn sold to GSEs by banks. GSEs then package these loans as mortgage backed securities and sell to investors and pension funds. As far as banks are concerned, the money they make is the origination fees and associated stuff. The loan itself doesn't stay on their books. Using vantagescore 4.0 to do credit scoring and underwriting is  cheaper since recently they have lowered the prices of vantagescore4.0 to 99 cents or something. 

So if you are a bank, GSEs have Now said you can use vantagescore4.0 or FICO to score and underwrite loans. For you, using Vantagescore4.0 is waay cheaper and will lower your costs and allow you to keep more of the loan origination fees. Why should you care even if FICO scoring might be better at detecting bad loans compared to vantagescore? You are anyway going to turn the loan over to GSEs right so the loans are going to be on their books not yours. If they go bad, that's Fannie and Freddie's problem not yours. And later problem of whomever buys MBS. Govt can't blame you because literally they have approved use of vantagescore . 

TLDR:

So FICO's problem is even if FICO truly has the better scoring and safer loans, banks are not incentives to use it but to go for the cheapest scoring algorithm approved. Which means either FICO has to lower prices or be okay with sharing revenue. If they have better algo, they might still be used for the 30 percent of loans which banks keep on their books. Honestly maybe instead of spending money to make their scoring better etc FICO  should have lobbied the govt and paid them all off to not allow Vantage4.0 or something.  Because clearly the govt doesn't care enough to actually conduct some studies and make sure that vantage4.0 and fico 10 T are comparable and both safe so as not to repeat 2008. 

 For what it's worth, FICO has a really good management team and is a well run company. They do what they do really well. I myself am a shareholder.  I don't know how low the shares will go. If the Fed is forced to cut when the economy crashes and 10 year yield goes down and mortgages come down, definitely lots of people will refinance and that should increase  FICOS mortgage loans segment revenue. 

what do you all think? I would love to hear thoughts and any points where I'm thinking wrong.

Summary

▶ Full Post Text

Ideas

More from Reddit — r/ValueInvesting