2024
Annual
Report
Dear Synchrony Stakeholders,
In 2024, Synchrony deepened our role within the
heart of American commerce and opportunity by
providing access to credit for tens of millions
of Americans to help them pay for the things that
matter. We also partnered with some of the country’s
biggest and most respected brands — and hundreds
of thousands of small and midsize businesses that
are the heartbeat of local economies.
We help people finance everyday purchases in health
and wellness, retail, telecommunications, home,
auto, outdoor, pet and more — everything from clothes,
tires and furniture to wellness for your family and your
pets. In the process of financing these purchases,
many consumers build stronger credit, enabling them
to access even more opportunity for a healthier
financial future.
We do all this by continuing to invest in a broad
range of flexible financing solutions and expertise,
a differentiated approach to underwriting, compelling
value propositions, and digital and in-store customer
experiences. Together, these capabilities allow us
to offer the right financing at the right time to benefit
people and businesses. We also continue to leverage
our scale, data analytics, lending expertise and
advanced digital capabilities to remain nimble and
responsive in a rapidly changing environment.
Synchrony’s offerings continue to resonate with
partners and customers, resulting in another year of
strong performance. Led by our team of more than
20,000, I am proud of the culture we have built together
at Synchrony — one based on trust, accountability
and a commitment to delivering outcomes that matter
for all stakeholders. It is that culture and our great team
that led us to being recognized as one of the nation’s
best places to work for the eighth year in a row.
In short, we delivered excellent results in 2024. Every
step of the way, we were guided by our fundamental
purpose: to be essential to consumers and their
families as well as to businesses and providers, and to
be trusted by — and responsible to — all stakeholders.
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SYNCHRONY ANNUAL REPORT 2024
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SYNCHRONY ANNUAL REPORT 2024
Synchrony delivered net earnings of $3.5 billion,
or $8.55 per diluted share and a return on average
assets of 2.9%. We acquired almost 20 million new
accounts and financed our second-highest level of
purchase volume at more than $182 billion. Deposits
in Synchrony Bank increased to $82.1 billion and
comprised 84% of Synchrony’s funding.
These results demonstrate the lasting appeal of our
diverse and flexible financing solutions as well as
our compelling value propositions. They highlight
the important role that credit plays as a catalyst for
opportunity in people’s everyday lives while helping
them build a healthier financial future.
In 2024, we further diversified the industries, products
and services for which Synchrony provides financing
solutions, while extending our customer reach. For
example, we added more than 45 new partners to serve
the needs and wants of Americans by partnering with
iconic brands like Virgin Red, guitar brand Gibson and
powersports provider BRP. We also continued to add new
technology-oriented relationships, including practice
management platform Adit and cloud-based software
company ServiceTitan, which extend our reach into
new markets and distribution channels by putting more
Synchrony financing options at the point of sale to
better serve customers and partners.
Synchrony expanded existing partnerships as well,
renewing more than 45 programs, including Dick’s
Sporting Goods, Generac, Verizon and more recently,
two of our top five long-term partners: Sam’s Club
(a 30-year relationship) and JCPenney (a 25-year
relationship).
Just as Synchrony evolved and expanded the ways in
which we deliver value through our partner programs
in 2024, we also diversified the programs and markets
we serve by expanding the breadth and utility of
our products:
+ We completed the acquisition of the Ally Lending
business, including 2,500 merchant locations and
more than 450,000 active borrowers in both home
improvement services and health-and-wellness
specialties, including roofing, HVAC and windows,
cosmetics, audiology and dentistry.
+ We finalized the sale of our Pets Best pet insurance
business to Independence Pet Holdings (IPH).
In addition to recognizing an $802 million after-tax
gain on the sale, we extended our reach in the rapidly
growing pet industry through an equity interest in
IPH. This includes opportunities to extend the reach
of CareCredit to IPH’s other pet insurance brands.
+ We launched “Better Together” with CareCredit
and Pets Best — a patent-pending, easy-to-use
innovation that connects the two solutions. Now,
insurance claims from Pets Best customers can be
reimbursed directly onto the CareCredit health-
and-wellness card. This simplified payment method
promises a cohesive experience for pet owners and
supports our growth in the pet care financing sector.
+ We launched CareCredit into additional wellness
markets to help people finance fertility, nutrition,
and diet-related products and services, which
supported almost 15% growth in wellness-related
purchase volume during 2024.
In addition, Synchrony enhanced the utility of several
of our private label credit cards by broadening their
acceptance and expanding their distribution channels:
+ The Amazon Store Card can now be used to pay
via mobile QR code for Amazon One Medical
memberships and for groceries and more at all
Whole Foods locations. The results have exceeded
expectations and build upon a strong foundation
of acceptance, including at Amazon.com,
Amazon Pay and Audible.
+ CareCredit cardholders can now pay for select
health-and-wellness products and services
across a growing list of approximately 18,000
retail acceptance locations, including Albertsons,
Sam’s Club, Walgreens and Walmart.
+ In keeping with our strategy of broadening product
utility, we continued to roll out our CareCredit Dual
Card — which can be used everywhere CareCredit
is accepted for health and wellness or for general
purchases wherever Mastercard is accepted. During
the past year, we grew open accounts by 16%.
Our 2024 Results
Thanks to its strong value proposition and utility,
about 60% of this product’s out-of-partner spend in
2024 was outside traditional health-and-wellness
categories.
Lastly, through strong execution and prudent
capital management, we returned $1.4 billion to share-
holders in 2024. This continued our long history of
capital returns, including buying back more than 50%
of our common stock and returning nearly $17 billion
to shareholders through repurchases since 2016.
We are confident in our strategy to continue to grow
sustainably and deliver resilient risk-adjusted returns
while also providing value to our shareholders, both
in the short and long term.
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SYNCHRONY ANNUAL REPORT 2024
One of the reasons partners choose and stay
with Synchrony is because of our customer experience
and broad range of innovative financing products
and services. From private label and co-brand
credit cards to promotional financing and “buy now,
pay later” offerings, our products are designed to
responsibly address each customer’s needs whenever
and however they look to make a purchase, while
driving growth and loyalty for our partners.
These products are powered by technology that
we believe is unmatched in the industry. A prime
example is our advanced credit decisioning platform,
PRISM, which uses data and analytics to provide a
comprehensive view of a consumer’s creditworthiness
beyond a traditional credit score. By identifying those
who deserve more — or less — credit than a credit
report would suggest, PRISM helps people responsibly
finance what they want while protecting them from
becoming overextended. It also protects against fraud
and is an engine that helps companies grow while
better serving their customers.
As purchases increasingly occur digitally — through
wallet apps and digital payments on a mobile device
or at the physical point of sale — Synchrony is bringing
our customer experience to life across our digital foot-
print. From our native apps to partner apps like
Apple Pay, to our Synchrony Marketplace and
Synchrony.com, we are deepening the role that
Synchrony plays within our customer and partner
relationships.
Through our efforts to expand Synchrony’s digital
presence, we’ve enhanced our cross-marketing
capabilities and strengthened partner and product
awareness with our customers. We are already seeing
customers engage with Synchrony more extensively —
visiting our sites more often and engaging longer on our
properties, contributing to incremental new accounts
and sales, as well as lower acquisition costs.
We’ve more than doubled the number of new
Synchrony Bank accounts acquired through
Synchrony.com with almost no associated cost.
Synchrony Marketplace — which connects people
with our partners through offers and deals — is a
growing part of our financial ecosystem. During
the last year, it hosted almost 228 million customer
visits and drove more than 17% growth in newly
submitted applications within Marketplace.
Synchrony’s digital wallet strategy also made
great strides in 2024, driving stronger engagement,
utility and purchasing power for our customers. In fact,
unique active users of Synchrony’s wallet grew 85%
compared with 2023, and contributed to more than
double the digital wallet sales in 2024. We are excited
about the opportunities to further drive our digital
penetration, including through our recent
announcement that eligible Synchrony Mastercard
holders checking out with Apple Pay can now choose
to pay with their credit card or use a promotional
offer that includes fixed monthly payments.
Building the Industry’s
Best Culture
These results and innovations are driven by the
company we have become and the great people who
are a part of it. Over the past four years, we’ve
diversified the markets we serve and transformed our
products, digital capabilities and customer experience.
We’ve also transformed and strengthened our culture.
Transforming the
Customer Experience
Drives Growth
We did this by inviting our people into the process of
co-creating the employee experience, including the
benefits we develop to support them, how we work
and innovate, the spaces we design to collaborate and
the processes we use to get things done.
For example, we’ve expanded flexibility and choice in
where we work, transformed outdated offices into
dynamic innovation and collaboration spaces, added
wellness and financial coaches to support employees
in achieving their personal and professional goals,
made backup childcare more accessible by covering
costs for any provider (even family and friends), and
enhanced our parental leave policy, which was already
among the best in the industry.
In 2024, we added new benefits based on employee
feedback, including an innovative program where
Synchrony will treat qualified monthly student loan
payments as if they were employee 401(k) plan
contributions, and provide a company match that goes
into their 401(k) account so that they can still receive
the company match while paying off their loans.
We also expanded our wellness reimbursement with
nontraditional options beyond gym memberships
to include marathons; race or tournament fees; team
and league registration fees; and individual classes
like martial arts, virtual fitness apps and intramural
sports leagues.
It is my belief that by listening to our employees
and co-creating these programs with them, we are
building a work environment that is supportive of their
needs and enables them to deliver great work, too.
It is why our attrition rates are at all-time lows and why
we continue to deliver consistently strong business
results for all stakeholders.
I am proud to see that our employees believe that too,
as we once again were recognized as a Top 5 Best
Company to Work For® in the U.S. by Fortune magazine
and Great Place to Work®. We have risen on the list
every year since 2019, from No. 51 then to No. 2 today.
The fact that this ranking is based on employee
feedback gives us confidence in our approach and
makes the ranking even more special.
Building a great culture also means doing
meaningful things in our communities. Our employees
devote their time and energy to giving back, including
volunteering more than 125,000 hours and giving
more than $25 million in employee matched
contributions to nonprofits around the globe since
we became Synchrony in 2014.
Last year, in honor of our 10-year anniversary
and through the support of the Synchrony Foundation,
we launched Give10, where 100 employees were
selected from thousands of nominations to direct
a $10,000 grant to the nonprofit organization of their
choice — a $1 million commitment to charities our
employees care about around the globe.
We also have several programs aimed at supporting
people through Synchrony’s Education as an Equalizer
program, a $50 million initiative to expand access
to higher education, skills training in high-growth fields,
and financial literacy for underserved communities
and our own workforce.
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SYNCHRONY ANNUAL REPORT 2024
Proud to Help People
Build Healthier Financial Lives
Our commitment is personal. Synchrony employees
are motivated to help others improve their lives through
credit. I recently heard a story about a young store
associate employed by one of our retail partners.
She was just starting out in the world and learned she
needed to build a credit history to lease an apartment
and buy a car. She didn’t know where to start. She
applied for a Synchrony store card, was approved and
soon built the credit history she needed to get the things
she wanted — including a home. Today, years later,
she attributes that moment to how she started building
a happy, successful and financially secure life.
There are countless stories like this one. Whether
assisting an individual consumer, finding new ways
to responsibly extend credit to more people or
helping businesses of all sizes grow, our employees
are proud of the role they play in people’s lives.
Thank you for
Choosing Synchrony
In short, everything we do — transforming the
customer experience, building a differented
and meaningful employee culture, driving growth
and loyalty for our partners, supporting our
communities, and all the rest — is a facet of the
same overarching purpose: to be essential to
people and businesses.
And we’ve been at it for a while. 2024 marked our
10-year anniversary as Synchrony and nearly 100 years
of playing a central role in driving economic growth
and prosperity through responsible credit and
financing programs.
As we strive to build on the successes of 2024
and the past 10 years, I want to thank our Synchrony
stakeholders: our people, our customers, our partners
and our communities. I also want to thank you, our
shareholders, for your confidence in our company and
your commitment to our future success.
As we look to 2025 and beyond, Synchrony is operating
from a position of strength. We are executing across
our key strategic priorities and delivering strong results.
Through the hard work of our people, we are priming
our business for profitable growth for years to come.
And we are laser-focused on driving considerable
long-term value for our shareholders.
It’s been a great 10 years — built on a foundation of
nearly 100 — but I am even more excited about what’s
ahead. I look forward to continued partnership and
collaboration as we strengthen our contributions
to the economy, to the lives of millions of American
consumers, the vitality of hundreds of thousands of
business owners, and the prosperity and strength
of the communities where we live, work and operate.
That is Synchrony, and we are proud to be at the
heart of American commerce and opportunity.
Brian Doubles
President and CEO
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SYNCHRONY ANNUAL REPORT 2024
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SYNCHRONY ANNUAL REPORT 2024
Financial Highlights
For the years ended, and at, December 31, 2024
(in millions unless otherwise stated except for per share data and ratios)
Financial Highlights
2024
2023
2022
Net interest income
$
18,011
$
16,999
$
15,625
Interest and fees on loans
$
21,596
$
19,902
$
16,881
Net earnings
$
3,499
$
2,238
$
3,016
Diluted earnings per share
$
8.55
$
5.19
$
6.15
Shares outstanding1
400.6
423.5
483.4
Period End
Total assets
$
119,463
$
117,479
$
104,564
Loan receivables
$
104,721
$
102,988
$
92,470
Deposits
$
82,062
$
81,153
$
71,735
Common equity Tier 1 capital ratio
13.3%
12.2%
13.3%
Performance Metrics
Purchase volume (in billions)2
$
182.2
$
185.2
$
180.2
Period-end active accounts (in thousands)3
$
71,532
$
73,484
$
70,763
Average active accounts (in thousands)3
$
70,904
$
70,337
$
68,627
Net interest margin4
14.76%
15.15%
15.63%
Net charge-off rate5
6.31%
4.87%
3.00%
30+ delinquency rate6
4.70%
4.74%
3.65%
Efficiency ratio7
30.0%
34.9%
37.2%
Return on assets8
2.9%
2.0%
3.1%
1 Diluted weighted average common shares outstanding.
2 Purchase volume, or net credit sales, represents the aggregate amount
of charges incurred on credit cards or other credit product accounts
less returns during the period. Purchase volume includes activity related
to our portfolios classified as held for sale.
3 Active accounts represent credit card or installment loan accounts on
which there has been a purchase, payment or outstanding balance in
the current month. Includes activity and accounts associated with loan
receivables held for sale.
4 Net interest margin represents net interest income divided by average
total interest-earning assets.
5 Net charge-off rate represents net charge-offs as a percentage of
average loan receivables, including those held for sale.
6 Based on customer statement-end balances extrapolated to the respective
period-end date.
7 Efficiency ratio is calculated as Total Other expense divided by sum of Net
interest income plus Other income less Retailer share arrangements (RSA).
8 Return on assets represents net earnings as a percentage of average
total assets.
SYNCHRONY
INVESTOR INQUIRIES
(NYSE: SYF)
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