EverQuote (EVER) Q4 2025 Earnings Call Transcript

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Date

Monday, Feb. 23, 2026, at 4:30 p.m. ET

Call participants

• Chief Executive Officer — Jayme Mendal
• Chief Financial Officer — Joseph Sanborn

Takeaways

• Total revenue -- $195.3 million for the quarter, up 32% year over year, with full-year revenue of $692.5 million, reflecting 38% growth.
• Auto insurance revenue -- $179.9 million in the quarter, up over 32% year over year; full-year auto revenue was $629.8 million, up 41%.
• Home insurance revenue -- $15.4 million in the quarter, up 37% year over year; full-year home revenue grew 20% to $62.7 million.
• Carrier spend -- Up 39% year over year, identified as the primary revenue driver.
• Variable marketing dollars (VMD) -- $49.3 million in the quarter, up 12% year over year; full-year VMD was $191.9 million, up 24%.
• Variable marketing margin (VMM) -- 25.3% for the quarter and 27.7% for the year.
• Adjusted EBITDA -- $25.1 million in the quarter, up 32% year over year, yielding a 12.8% margin; full-year adjusted EBITDA was $94.6 million, up 62%, with a 13.7% margin.
• GAAP net income -- $57.8 million for the quarter (includes a one-time $38.4 million non-cash tax benefit); quarterly net income excluding the benefit was $19.3 million; full-year GAAP net income was $99.3 million, or $60.9 million excluding the benefit.
• Operating cash flow -- $27 million for the quarter and $95.4 million for the year.
• Cash and debt position -- $171.4 million in cash and no debt at year-end.
• Share repurchase -- $30 million repurchased since July 2025 under a $50 million program; $9 million repurchased since the start of 2026.
• Q4 sequential revenue growth -- 12% increase from Q3 to Q4, a significant deviation from historical seasonal declines.
• 2026 revenue guidance -- Projected range of $175 million to $185 million for Q1.
• 2026 VMD and adjusted EBITDA guidance -- VMD of $49 million to $52 million and adjusted EBITDA of $23.5 million to $26.5 million for Q1.
• AI initiatives -- Expanded deployment in bidding automation, call center operations, and product development, with growth in Smart Campaigns and adoption of generative AI in operations.
• Product suite expansion -- Smart Campaigns now adopted by most carriers and being extended to local agents and new verticals.
• Agent penetration -- 40% of agents now use more than one product, with the average at 1.4 products per agent, up from approximately 1.0 eighteen months ago.
• Carrier mix and market dynamics -- In Q4, 75% of the top 25 carriers were still below peak spend, and one large national carrier is set to re-enter the platform in 2026.
• Home vertical opportunity -- Home insurance revenue grew 20% in the year and is expected to outpace auto growth in the medium term.

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Risks

• Joseph Sanborn stated, "carriers take a more disciplined approach to Q1 marketing spend as they begin a new budget year and seek to position themselves to have greater flexibility as the year unfolds," suggesting potentially softer Q1 growth compared to Q4 due to shifted carrier spending.
• Joseph Sanborn noted, "we don’t control absolute ad costs, only acquisition efficiency," indicating that a more competitive ad environment could affect margins despite operational improvements.
• Jayme Mendal remarked that, "The shift is from a period focused on rate adequacy and underwriting profitability to one focused on aggressively but profitably growing policies in force," which could imply increased competition and variable near-term growth.

Summary

EverQuote (NASDAQ:EVER) reported record revenue growth in both auto and home insurance segments, achieving sequential revenue growth in a seasonally down quarter due to accelerated carrier spending. Management reiterated its medium-term target of $1 billion in revenue within two to three years, driven by AI-enabled marketplace efficiency, expansion in new traffic channels, and deeper product integration with both carriers and agents. The company’s strong cash position, no debt, and ongoing share repurchases provide flexibility for continued organic investments and potential M&A. Management provided initial Q1 2026 guidance reflecting a measured approach by carriers in spending, with profitability and operating leverage expected to persist as AI adoption and multisided marketplace penetration deepen.

• Management indicated that 75% of top carriers remain below historical peak spending levels on the platform, implying headroom for incremental carrier budget allocation as industry conditions improve.
• A renewed relationship with a major national carrier and further progress in high-potential states such as California are positioned as possible growth catalysts in 2026.
• EverQuote detailed three integration strategies with large language model (LLM) platforms — content, technical, and programmatic — intending to develop proprietary user experiences and capture emerging AI-driven insurance shopping traffic.
• Company confirmed that variable marketing margin for 2026 is expected in the high-20% range, with quarter-to-quarter variability, but underscored that future investment will continue to prioritize VMD dollar generation over margin percentage maximization.
• Cash generation remains robust, with operating cash flow conversion from adjusted EBITDA approaching 100% in Q4, ensuring capacity for opportunistic buybacks and selective acquisitions without the necessity for inorganic growth to reach long-term targets.

Industry glossary

• Variable marketing dollars (VMD): Advertising spend that can be flexibly adjusted in response to demand and channel performance, directly tied to revenue-driving marketing activity.
• Variable marketing margin (VMM): Gross profit after deducting variable marketing dollars, expressed as a percentage of revenue; reflects marketing efficiency.
• Smart Campaigns: EverQuote’s proprietary AI-powered bidding solution for insurance carriers and agents to optimize customer acquisition spending.
• LLM (Large Language Model): Advanced AI platforms such as chatbots capable of complex natural language understanding and interaction, increasingly leveraged for search and comparison in online marketplaces.

Full Conference Call Transcript

Operator: We enter 2026 from a position of strength, and with a stable and healthy P&C insurance market. Consumer shopping levels remain elevated following rate increases in recent years. Carrier underwriting is profitable, and our carrier conversations about 2026 have centered around growth. This backdrop supports a confident outlook for 2026. Since going public in 2018, EverQuote, Inc. management has established a seven-year track record of delivering against our commitments while navigating an always dynamic set of market conditions. We now reiterate our next commitment, which is to achieve $1 billion of revenue while continuing to expand the cash generation of our marketplace.

We will do this amidst continued dynamism in the market, this time brought on by the rapid acceleration of the capabilities of AI. We believe that we are well positioned to lead and benefit from this shift. Applying data and technology to insurance shopping to remove friction for consumers and deliver growth to providers has been deeply ingrained in our DNA since our founding. We have amassed a one-of-a-kind data moat from our hundreds of millions of historical insurance shopping events, each of which contributes proprietary data that could be used in many ways to create enhanced digital and AI-native experiences.

In recent years, we have applied AI to automate our traffic bidding, we have rolled out products like Smart Campaigns, our AI provider bidding solution, we have deployed AI voice into our call center operations, and we have begun adopting GenAI throughout our operations to drive efficiency. All of these advances have contributed to our growing operating leverage, punctuated by last year's 62% growth in adjusted EBITDA and a more than doubling of our revenue since 2023, despite nearly zero increase in our operating expenses. In 2026, EverQuote, Inc. will accelerate our evolution towards an AI-first future.

Within our operations, we will further accelerate our engineering team's path to more fulsome agentic coding, and adoption of AI tools and agents throughout our operations to drive further operating efficiency. For our customers, we will roll out new products and features that combine our unique data with newfound capabilities of generative AI to accelerate their ability to derive value from this technology. We look forward to sharing more about some exciting features we are developing later this year. I want to thank and congratulate the EverQuote, Inc. team for delivering results in 2025 that exceeded expectations.

As we progress into 2026, we will build on this momentum and are taking steps that redefine EverQuote, Inc. and insurance distribution for the age of AI. I will now turn the call over to Joseph Sanborn to discuss our financial results.

Joseph Sanborn: Thank you, Jayme, and thank you all for joining. Today, I will be discussing our financial results for the fourth quarter and full year 2025, as well as our guidance for 2026. We delivered strong results in Q4, exceeding our prior guidance across all metrics, and closed out a record year in which we achieved total revenue growth of 38% year over year to $692.5 million, adjusted EBITDA expansion of 62% year over year to $94.6 million. Total revenues in the fourth quarter grew 32% year over year to a record $195.3 million. Revenue growth was primarily driven by stronger carrier spend, which was up 39% year over year.

Revenue from our auto insurance vertical increased to $179.9 million in Q4, up over 32% year over year. Full-year auto insurance revenue grew 41% year over year to $629.8 million. Revenue from our home insurance vertical increased to $15.4 million in Q4, up 37% year over year. Full-year home insurance revenue grew 20% to $62.7 million. As we mentioned last quarter, our strong revenue growth through the first nine months of 2025 gave us the opportunity to invest more in existing and new traffic lines during the fourth quarter to support future growth.

The strategy worked, and as expected, these investments put temporary pressure on the variable marketing dollars, or VMD, and variable marketing margin, or VMM, during the period, which in turn impacted our Q4 adjusted EBITDA and associated margin. Fourth quarter VMD was $49.3 million, an increase of 12% from the prior-year period, representing a 25.3% VMM. For the full year, VMD grew 24% to $191.9 million, representing a 27.7% VMM.

As we scale and drive top-line growth, we continue to expand operating leverage in our business through the use of AI, other technologies, and disciplined expense management. While other technology companies are describing their plans to make AI investments to deliver incremental efficiency, we have been on this path at EverQuote, Inc. for over two years. In the fourth quarter, we grew GAAP net income to $57.8 million, up from $12.3 million in the prior-year period. GAAP net income this quarter included a one-time non-cash tax benefit of $38.4 million, primarily driven by the release of the valuation allowance against our deferred tax assets. Full-year 2025 GAAP net income increased to $99.3 million compared to $32.2 million for 2024.

Without the impact of these deferred tax benefits, we would have reported net income in Q4 and full year 2025 of $19.3 million and $60.9 million, representing a year-on-year increase of 5,789%, respectively. Q4 adjusted EBITDA increased 32% from the prior-year period to $25.1 million, representing a 12.8% adjusted EBITDA margin. Adjusted EBITDA for the full year increased 62% to $94.6 million, representing an adjusted EBITDA margin of 13.7%, an increase of approximately 200 basis points over 2024. Cash operating expenses, which excludes advertising spend and certain non-cash and other one-time charges, were $24.3 million in Q4, down modestly from Q3.

For the full year 2025, we also continued to drive strong operating leverage in our model, with total cash operating expenses of approximately $97 million being effectively flat year over year. At the same time, our steadfast commitment to drive increasing efficiencies through automation in our core operations enabled us to shift significant additional investment through 2025 into areas that drive future growth, such as AI capabilities, new products, and data science. As Jayme mentioned, since 2023, we have more than doubled revenues while keeping operating expenses essentially flat.

We delivered strong operating cash flow of $27 million for the quarter and $95.4 million for the full year 2025. We ended the period with no debt, and cash and cash equivalents of $171.4 million. As a reminder, we implemented a $50 million share repurchase program last July. To date, we have repurchased approximately $30 million of shares, including approximately $9 million since the start of 2026. We are pleased with our outperformance in the fourth quarter, as we benefited from carriers who were well below their targeted combined ratios for the year and accelerated spend, deciding to not delay additional new customer acquisition until 2026.

As a result of this dynamic, Q4 revenues were up a record 12% sequentially, meaningfully breaking with our previous seasonal pattern in which revenues declined sequentially on average in mid-single-digit percentage from Q3 to Q4.

Turning to 2026, we continue to operate in a favorable industry environment. Our carrier partners are indicating that 2026 will be a growth year, in which they will compete more aggressively for profitable policy growth after a two-plus-year focus on rate restoration and underwriting margin recovery. We expect this growth to be measured. Following carriers' record level investment in new customer acquisition in Q4, we are seeing carriers take a more disciplined approach to Q1 marketing spend as they begin a new budget year and seek to position themselves to have greater flexibility as the year unfolds.

This contrasts with our historical seasonal patterns, which would customarily see a sequential step up into Q1, as carriers would look to aggressively start a new year by quickly deploying budget and then consider tapering spend as they progress through the year based on their underwriting profitability.

Now, turning to guidance for 2026, we expect revenue to be between $175 million and $185 million. We expect VMD to be between $49 million and $52 million, and we expect adjusted EBITDA to be between $23.5 million and $26.5 million. Entering 2026, we believe that we are well positioned to operate in a dynamic environment fueled by a rapidly evolving AI landscape. From our experience in serving insurance providers over the past few years, our battle-hardened team has honed its ability to quickly adapt our operations to changes in the environment with a clear-eyed view towards identifying opportunities that will both enable us to better serve our customers and drive strong financial performance.

As Jayme shared in his remarks, we have recognized and embraced AI capabilities that allow us to more aggressively adapt our operations and investment approach to create opportunities for EverQuote, Inc. to deliver long-term sustainable growth. We look forward to sharing more with you on our achievements over the course of the year. In summary, our record 2025 performance reflects our steadfast commitment to strong execution and a clear growth strategy.

As we look at the remainder of this year and beyond, we are focused on our goal of creating a $1 billion revenue business over the next two to three years by being the leading growth partner for P&C insurance providers, and doing so in a manner that will generate expanding levels of profitability and free cash flow. Jayme and I will now take your questions.

Operator: Thank you. And we will now begin the question and answer session. If you have dialed in and would like to ask a question, please press 1 on your telephone keypad to raise your hand and join the queue. If you are called upon to ask your question and are listening via speakerphone on your device, please pick up your handset and ensure that your phone is not on mute when asking your question. Again, it is 1 to join the queue. And our first question comes from the line of Maria Ripps with Canaccord Genuity. Your line is open.

Maria Ripps: Great. Thanks so much for taking my question. I know you are not providing full-year guidance at this time, but maybe any directional color you could share in terms of the growth trajectory throughout the year based on conversations with your carrier partners? I guess, how should investors think about sort of growth normalizing from this projected Q1 level?

Jayme Mendal: Sure. Thanks, Maria, for the question. Just want to make sure everyone can hear us okay. You were breaking up a bit. I think the question was about the outlook for full year 2026 based on the Q1 guide and whether we can give some insight on the rest of the year. We are not giving that, but I can offer some context. We’ll start with our carrier partners indicating that 2026 will be a growth year for them, broadly, with a focus on competing for profitable policy growth after a two-plus-year period focused on rate adequacy and underwriting margins.

We are seeing a disciplined approach to starting Q1, in part reflecting a really strong Q4, where we were up sequentially 12% to a record level. For the rest of the year, I would refer you to what we talked about in our November call: our path to $1 billion in revenues remains unchanged. We plan to be a $1 billion revenue company in two to three years. If that happens in three years, that implies roughly 13% top-line growth; in two years, about 20%–21%. Some years will be higher, some lower. On EBITDA, we said in November that on our path to $1 billion, EBITDA margins would expand between 100 and 150 basis points annually.

We are reiterating that view. For 2026, we think closer to 100 basis points, reflecting that 2025 saw 200 basis points of improvement. Finally, if you consider that top-line outlook, it implies at least 20% EBITDA dollar growth for 2026.

Maria Ripps: And then can you maybe share a little bit more color around your traffic investments in Q4 and, particularly, anything you can share about AI-related search and the quality of that traffic? Do you anticipate any of those benefits flowing into Q1 and 2026?

Jayme Mendal: Yeah. Broadly, we mentioned previously that we were investing in un- or under-penetrated traffic channels, particularly higher-funnel channels, from late last year into early this year. We were able to drive significant scale through some of these channels in Q4. As Joseph referenced, standing up new traffic programs requires a burn-in period before reaching steady-state margins, which put temporary pressure on Q4 margins. In Q1, margins are normalizing back toward steady-state. This will be an ongoing process as we step into more channels over the course of the year. Our goal is to continue growing quote request volume and traffic to meet customer demand by launching and scaling incremental channels and programs.

On AI search specifically, we are actively talking to and building into the big LLM chatbot platforms, and we expect to see traffic grow from those platforms in 2026. There are three main integration vectors: content (a new version of SEO aligned to LLM training), technical integrations or apps within those platforms, and paid advertising as those platforms open inventory. We’re positioning across all three. On content, we benefit from a clean-sheet approach without legacy SEO baggage, allowing us to tailor content to how LLMs absorb information. On technical integrations, we plan to leverage our proprietary data and distribution relationships to create differentiated user experiences. And on programmatic, as paid options open up, we intend to be first in line.

We expect this to become a channel of substance in 2026.

Operator: Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Cory Carpenter with JPMorgan. Your line is open.

Cory Carpenter: Good afternoon. Jayme, maybe one for you and one for Joseph. Jayme, can you provide an update on your newer products and becoming a holistic suite—progress with AI bidding and Smart Campaigns subscriptions that are in earlier stages? And Joseph, squaring the confidence in $1 billion over two or three years (13%–21% guardrails) with a Q1 guide implying about 8% growth—what gives you confidence in reacceleration over the next year or two?

Jayme Mendal: Thanks, Cory. On broadening the suite from lead-gen to growth solutions, we made significant progress last year. Smart Campaigns expanded to the bulk of our carrier customers over the last couple of years, and this year we’ll roll out a version for local agents. We’re also extending it across referral types and verticals—calls and home. We’re improving the models with features like auction competitiveness and more reinforcement learning. By year-end, we expect wide adoption across our distribution, including many agents. With local agents more broadly, the vision is to evolve from a lead vendor to a one-stop growth partner by adding value-added products around our core lead offering, accessing more of their growth budgets.

We now have 40% of agents using more than one product across leads, calls, telephony, and digital solutions.

Joseph Sanborn: On the path to $1 billion, our framework remains the same across four areas. First, distribution: gaining more carrier budget and pricing as we improve performance, principally via AI products like Smart Campaigns, which the majority of carriers now use. We expect more budget to flow through Smart over time. Second, agents: expanding share of agent marketing budgets through a multiproduct strategy; we’re at roughly 1.4 products per agent now, up from near 1.0 eighteen months ago. Third, traffic: expanding into new channels. Q4 investments are progressing well; AI search should be a tailwind as it matures. Fourth, verticals: today we are roughly 90% auto, 10% home, while home is about 50% the size of auto in P&C.

We see home growing faster than auto in the medium term; home grew 20% last year and we feel bullish. On Q1 vs. Q4 dynamics, we may be seeing a new seasonal pattern. Historically Q3 to Q4 is down low single digits; this year Q4 was up 12% sequentially, a record, as some carriers accelerated growth given favorable combined ratios—pulling some Q1 spend into Q4. For 2026, carriers broadly want to grow but are pacing themselves to maintain flexibility. That could lead to a more sustained pattern through the year, rather than hot starts and tapering.

While we’re not guiding the full year, a reasonable way to think about Q2 is flattish with Q1 on revenues, VMD, and adjusted EBITDA, which implies higher year-over-year growth in Q2 than Q1. On the two-to-three-year path, that’s roughly 15%–16% in a mid-case.

Operator: Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Ralph Schackart with William Blair. Your line is open.

Ralph Schackart: Good afternoon. First for Jayme: there’s concern about how AI agents could disrupt models. How do you see AI agents progressing within your platform and more broadly in P&C? And for Joseph: VMD margin appears to have bounced back or is guided to in Q1—how should we think about that margin through the year?

Jayme Mendal: Thanks, Ralph. There’s a misconception about our exposure to AI agents. We’re not a software-only business; we’re a data-powered two-sided marketplace. Much of our value is in proprietary data, our traffic engine, and our regulated distribution relationships, integrated into a complex performance marketing system. That’s not easily replicated by LLMs without substantial human and domain involvement. Insurance shopping is opaque: many of the best carrier rates are not available via public APIs, and carriers actively prevent rate access outside their quoting funnels. Today’s agent experiences are largely conversational wrappers that hand consumers back into standard web quoting. Over time, agents will enable more transformative change, and we expect EverQuote, Inc. to be in the driver’s seat.

We have the distribution access to rates, the data to streamline experiences, and the technology to build the next-gen journey. Near-term, AI is already improving our marketplace efficiency (bidding, operations, engineering productivity, AI voice), and can enhance customer comparison experiences. That’s a core focus this year.

Joseph Sanborn: On VMM, Q4 was about 25%, consistent with our plan to invest in new channels. For Q1, our guide implies high-20s VMM—28% at the midpoint—consistent with normalization after burn-in. For the full year, we expect high-20s VMM, with normal quarter-to-quarter variability. Two drivers of variability: first, we manage day to day to maximize VMD dollars first, not VMM percentage. Second, we don’t control absolute ad costs, only acquisition efficiency. Despite a more competitive ad environment versus 2023, we’ve maintained high-20s VMM at nearly triple the auto revenue scale due to AI bidding and traffic platform investments that improve efficiency.

Operator: Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Mayank Tandon with Needham. Your line is open.

Mayank Tandon: Good evening, Jayme and Joseph. In terms of upside to Q1 and for 2026—assuming a low-teens base case from the three-year $1 billion target—what’s the bull-case catalyst? Is California a potential positive? And last quarter you mentioned 20 of the top 25 carriers were still below peak spend—could that drive upside? And for Joseph, on capital allocation, with strong cash, beyond buybacks does this open more appetite for M&A?

Jayme Mendal: Thanks, Mayank. The range remains: path to $1 billion in two to three years—20% if two years, 13% if three. Bull-case drivers could include: one large national carrier, previously a top-three partner pre-downturn, is coming back online this year—timing and ramp could be an upside swing factor. On state footprint, California showed progress in 2025 with room for incremental progress in 2026. More broadly, insurance remains a laggard in moving online versus other verticals; as penetration catches up, that secular tailwind could push growth toward the higher end in certain years.

Joseph Sanborn: On capital allocation, we expect to continue generating meaningful operating cash flow, with high conversion from adjusted EBITDA—around 100% in Q4—ending Q4 with $171 million in cash and no debt (access to up to $85 million if needed). Priorities: maintain a strong balance sheet; execute our $50 million repurchase program (about $30 million used to date, including $9 million since the start of 2026; we’ll be opportunistic with the remaining $20 million through program expiry this summer and evaluate extending); and selectively evaluate acquisitions. We don’t need M&A to reach $1 billion organically, but targeted M&A could accelerate our strategy to be the leading growth partner for P&C carriers and agents.

Operator: Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Zachary Cummins with B. Riley Securities. Your line is open.

Zachary Cummins: Thanks for taking my questions. Jayme, have you seen meaningful changes in traffic mix with the emergence of large LLM platforms—any shift in channels or focus? And Joseph, as you set baseline expectations with carriers, are you anticipating a broadening of contribution across your carrier base this year?

Jayme Mendal: We’ve seen no material direct impact or mix shift from AI search platforms so far. Overall volumes, including search, remained at historically high levels throughout last year. The main industry impact has been on organic/SEO traffic, which was never a major part of our mix. We view LLM platforms as a growth opportunity in 2026 via content, technical integrations, and paid advertising. We’re also expanding higher-funnel channels like social video, supported by evolving digital experiences tailored for those environments.

Joseph Sanborn: On carrier contribution, a few data points. In Q4, 75% of our top 25 carriers were below their peak quarterly spend on our platform—ample room to grow. Our top four carriers in Q4 were the same as in Q3, with some share shifts; positions five through ten saw more movement. We expect potentially more competitive movement in Q1 as carriers focus on profitable policy growth in a softening market cycle, shifting from rate restoration to share-aware growth. We also have another national carrier re-entering the marketplace, which should increase competition. Overall, more carriers competing for profitable growth is healthy for our marketplace and digital channels.

Operator: Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Jed Kelly with Oppenheimer. Your line is open.

Jed Kelly: Thanks. Given carriers historically haven’t wanted to put quotes on third-party sites, should aggregators like you benefit within new LLMs if carriers won’t expose rates on LLMs? And as carriers implement AI and improve profitability, does that make them lean more into channels that can drive traffic?

Jayme Mendal: We agree. Carriers are protective of their rates and have resisted traditional rate comparison in the U.S. You can find some comparisons, but they typically cover only a subset and miss some of the best products. That dynamic won’t materially change just because of new tech. It creates an opportunity for us, given our unique access to carrier distribution—through rates, local agents, or bridging into carrier quoting experiences. We can orchestrate this complex distribution landscape on behalf of LLMs looking to connect consumers to insurance. Our company was built on marrying data and technology to connect consumers with distribution, and our hundreds of millions of historical shopping events provide proprietary data to streamline and innovate AI-native experiences.

We’re well positioned to go on offense here. On your follow-up, as carriers deploy AI and drive cost savings, combined ratios should improve, giving them more capacity to invest in growth channels like ours. Beyond being a beneficiary of increased marketing spend, we can also help carriers leverage AI faster, whether via productizing solutions like Smart Campaigns or partnering more deeply to support their AI strategies.

Operator: Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Mitchell Rubin with Raymond James. Your line is open.

Mitchell Rubin: Good evening. In the prepared remarks, you mentioned carriers taking a more disciplined approach in ’26 following record levels in Q4. Is the pullback broad-based or concentrated?

Jayme Mendal: We’re seeing the discipline theme across multiple carriers. The shift is from a period focused on rate adequacy and underwriting profitability to one focused on aggressively but profitably growing policies in force. Given changing dynamics, carriers want flexibility throughout the year, rather than the old pattern of going very heavy out of the gate in Q1 and tapering. Some are more measured than others, but it’s a multi-carrier dynamic.

Mitchell Rubin: Could you provide more color on the deferred tax benefit recorded in the quarter and what led to the valuation allowance release?

Joseph Sanborn: The approximately $38 million tax benefit in Q4 and full year reflects the release of our valuation allowance against deferred tax assets, primarily NOLs, as we’ve demonstrated sustained profitability and now expect to utilize those NOLs. It’s a one-time, non-cash benefit and aligns with what peers in our space have experienced as they inflected to profitability.

Operator: And that concludes our question and answer session. I will now turn the conference back over to management for closing remarks.

Jayme Mendal: Thank you, and thanks all for joining. To recap, we had a phenomenal year in 2025 with records across our key financial metrics, and we’re carrying that momentum into 2026 with a healthy insurance market hungry for growth. With a team that has a long-standing track record of using proprietary data and technology to drive profitable growth, we see the recent acceleration in AI capabilities as a huge opportunity for EverQuote, Inc. We feel very well positioned going into 2026, and we intend to lead insurance distribution into a more AI-native future. We look forward to updating everyone as the year progresses.

Operator: And ladies and gentlemen, this concludes today's call, and we thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect.

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