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Affirm Holdings lets shoppers buy now and repay over time, while merchants offer it at checkout to help complete sales. It checks each transaction before offering repayment terms. Interest-bearing monthly loans account for most purchase volume; Pay-in-X and interest-free monthly plans provide alternatives. Interest is its largest revenue source, followed by merchant fees, which are generally higher on interest-free financing. Affirm charges no late fees or compounding interest. Its business is concentrated in the United States.
Celtic Bank and Lead Bank originate most platform loans, and Affirm purchases the loans they offer it; Affirm also lends directly through licensed subsidiaries. It borrows against loans it keeps and sells others to investors, earning gains on sales and fees for continuing to manage repayments. The Affirm Card and virtual cards extend its financing to purchases beyond integrated checkouts and earn it a share of merchant-paid card transaction fees.
The business depends on repeat purchases, consumer repayment and continued funding from lenders and loan buyers. Amazon supplies a large share of purchase volume, and Shopify is another significant commercial relationship. Affirm also relies on its originating banks, whose lending policies it must follow. Lending licenses and rules governing interest rates, fees and consumer protection limit where and on what terms it can offer credit.
The risk section is the longest, dullest part of the filing. This keeps only what can really hurt you: where it hits, how hard, when it plays out.
Every company claims an edge. Each one is checked against hard numbers like margins and returns: which hold, and which line gives way first.
Watch Block and Synchrony too: both are important rivals to Affirm in financing purchases, but neither appears in this list.
Klarna Group competes with Affirm for merchants and shoppers choosing pay-over-time financing at checkout, with earnings driven mainly by merchants' sales through its network rather than consumer interest alone. Watch its mostly interest-free short-term financing: growth there shows how strongly that alternative is competing for checkout purchases.
PayPal competes with Affirm for shoppers' checkout transactions through merchant payments and pay-over-time options, earning mainly fees for processing payments and related services. Its consumer credit interest and fees are a more focused line to watch for financing competition than its broader payment revenue.
Bread Financial Holdings, Inc. competes with Affirm to finance U.S. shoppers' purchases through Bread Pay installments and merchant-branded credit cards, earning mainly interest and fees from borrowers. Watch its branded-card partnerships: generally exclusive contracts lasting five to ten years can keep merchants tied to its financing.
Affirm depends heavily on Amazon's retail checkout business: purchases financed there accounted for 22% of Affirm's merchandise volume in the fiscal year ended June 30, 2026, and Affirm charges merchants fees for facilitating transactions. Watch Amazon's use of Affirm for purchases in its online and physical stores; doing less business with this partner would expose a substantial share of Affirm's volume.
Shopify and Affirm both benefit from merchants' sales, beyond their significant distribution partnership: merchants pay Shopify for commerce software and Affirm for financing shoppers' transactions. Watch sales by Shopify Plus and enterprise merchants, which generate most of Shopify's merchandise volume.
Upstart Holdings and Affirm both rely on lending partners and outside loan capital to grow consumer lending, using their own models to assess borrowers' repayment risk. Upstart earns fees from lenders and institutional investors; watch its lending-partner activity, since its three largest partners originated 83% of marketplace loans in 2025.
Pagaya Technologies Ltd. and Affirm are both exposed to investors' willingness to fund consumer loans and to how borrowers repay: Pagaya connects lenders with investors, while Affirm sells loans directly or packages them into securities. Pagaya earns fees from lenders and institutional investors, making investor participation in its personal, auto and purchase-financing loans worth watching for the funding conditions Affirm also faces.
Capital One competes with Affirm's installment loans and Affirm Card by lending shoppers money through consumer credit cards, earning lending income and transaction and customer fees. Watch its domestic consumer card business, where pricing, credit limits and rewards help attract the shoppers Affirm also seeks.
Atlanticus Holdings Corporation competes with Affirm's merchant installment financing by helping U.S. lenders offer merchant-specific credit at retail and healthcare checkouts. It supplies credit-decision technology and manages payments and accounts for bank partners that retain ownership; watch its retail and healthcare card programs rather than its separate auto-finance business.
For Happen, Inc., the supplied business information describes LendingClub, whose merchant-linked major-purchase loans compete with Affirm's purchase financing and earn borrower interest and origination fees. Watch that business's fixed-rate installment loans offered through healthcare providers and merchants for planned medical, dental and other higher-cost purchases.
American Express competes with Affirm's installment loans and Affirm Card by financing cardholders' purchases, earning mainly from card spending and also from financing charges and fees. Watch consumer card spending and borrowing, where its card financing offers shoppers an alternative to Affirm's pay-over-time loans.
Capital One Financial earningsCOF
Capital One’s report will show spending and borrowing in its domestic consumer-card business, revealing whether cards are drawing shoppers Affirm also seeks.
Look at domestic consumer-card spending and borrowing, and how pricing, credit limits and rewards attract customers. Stronger activity would point to firmer competition for Affirm’s shoppers from cards; weaker activity would suggest less pressure from that channel, but would not establish Affirm’s own performance.
Fed Interest Rate Decision
For Affirm, the Fed’s decision tracks the economy’s benchmark borrowing rate, which can change what it pays to fund installment loans and what it earns on them.
Expected4.0%Last release4.0%
If it comes in above expectations
If the policy rate is higher than expected, borrowing costs may rise for Affirm’s warehouse and other debt funding, squeezing the economics of originating or buying loans; how quickly costs adjust is not specified.
If it comes in below expectations
If the policy rate is lower than expected, borrowing costs may ease for Affirm’s warehouse and other debt funding, supporting the economics of originating or buying loans; how quickly costs adjust is not specified.
Amazon.Com Inc earningsAMZN
Amazon’s report will show whether shoppers keep using Affirm at its online and physical-store checkouts, a major source of Affirm’s transaction volume and merchant fees.
Look at Amazon’s retail business and whether it continues offering Affirm at checkout. More use would support Affirm’s transaction volume and merchant-fee revenue; less use would put an important source of transactions at risk.
Affirm Holdings, Inc. earningsThis company
Affirm’s report will show whether more purchases on its platform translate into merchant fees and loan income without weakening credit performance.
Read GMV growth alongside merchant network revenue as a share of GMV, then check credit-loss provisions and delinquencies. Rising volume with stable merchant revenue per dollar and controlled credit metrics would show growth is being monetized without clear damage to loan quality; a falling revenue share or rising losses would mean weaker economics and could strain lending and funding.
Retail Sales MoM (Oct)
For Affirm, retail sales track consumer spending at stores, which can change the value of transactions on its platform and the merchant fees it earns when participating merchants confirm purchases.
Stronger retail sales point to more spending that may support transactions on Affirm’s platform, GMV and merchant-fee revenue; weaker sales point to less spending that may weigh on those transactions and fees.
