Jim Cramer delivers strong buy call on fast-growing digital bank

When a CEO is buying his own company's shares on the open market several times in a single year, and Jim Cramer is simultaneously telling viewers to buy at the same price level, I pay attention, and I also think you should.

On June 18, in the Mad Money Lightning Round, Cramer was direct about SoFi Technologies (SOFI). 

Cramer continues to tell his viewers, as CNBC reports. "It's hanging around that level. I continue to believe it's time to buy." That's not a hedged take, but a conviction call. 

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SoFi CEO Anthony Noto has also spent millions buying his own stock in 2026

CEO Anthony Noto has been making the same bet with his own money all year long. Most recently, picking up another 13,888 shares on June 16 at a weighted average of $18.06, according to a Form 4 filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

His 2026 insider buying now totals approximately $2.25 million across five open-market transactions. No awards. No grants. Personal capital, deployed repeatedly at market prices between $15.73 and $18.06, according to SEC filings. 

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BigGo Finance data show that in total, Noto has purchased 130,211 shares this year at a blended average of roughly $17.29 and now holds approximately 11.96 million SOFI shares directly.

What makes the pattern compelling isn't just the dollar amount. It's the consistency. He bought near $18 in March, again near $17 two weeks later, twice at the 2026 lows in May, and came back again in June at $18. 

He's actually not chasing momentum. He's treating every pullback as an opportunity. It’s fair to say that that's a very specific message from the person with the clearest view of the company's fundamentals.

SoFi's record Q1 shows a business growing faster than the stock price suggests

Here's what I keep coming back to when I look at SOFI down 31.59% year-to-date, according to Yahoo Finance. The underlying business didn't slow down. If anything, it accelerated.

SoFi reported Q1 2026 adjusted net revenue of $1.1 billion, up 41% year-over-year (YoY), and adjusted EBITDA of $340 million, up 62% YoY. Both were records, according to SoFi’s company statement. 

Total loan originations hit a record $12.2 billion. Membership grew 35% YoY to 14.7 million — the third consecutive quarter of 35% growth. Net income came in at $167 million.

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I went ahead to crunch the Rule of 40 score, an industry benchmark that combines revenue growth rate and profit margin to gauge business health. 

A score above 40 is considered strong. SoFi delivered 72% — its 18th consecutive quarter above that threshold, according to the company statement. Most mature software companies struggle to clear 40.

The metric I watch most closely is the cross-buy rate. In Q1, 43% of new products came from existing members, according to the same company statement. 

That tells me SoFi isn't just acquiring customers, but it's deepening relationships with the ones it already has. Noto framed it this way in the company statement: "More people choose SoFi as their trusted partner for major financial decisions and all the days in between."

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SoFi's digital banking model is harder to replicate than it looks

SoFi is the largest U.S.-based online lender as of 2026, with nearly 15 million customers, according to SoFi, and the first fintech company to receive a U.S. banking license.

Remember that’s a regulatory advantage most competitors still don't have. And also, the first U.S. national bank to offer crypto trading and issue its own stablecoin on a public blockchain.

That stablecoin move is worth noting. In Q1, SoFi began minting SoFiUSD, its U.S. dollar-reserved stablecoin, and is developing settlement capabilities through Mastercard to enable transactions across global payment networks, according to the company statement.

That's an infrastructure play positioning SoFi inside the emerging digital payments ecosystem at the ground floor.

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The lending business? Also accelerating in ways the headline stock performance doesn't reflect. Personal loan originations hit a record $8.3 billion. Student loan originations reached $2.6 billion, up 2.2 times YoY.

Home loan originations came in at $1.2 billion, up nearly 2.4 times YoY, according to SoFi’s Q1 fiscal 2026 earnings results statement. Brokerage fee revenue more than doubled over the past year.

SoFi also ranked number one in the J.D. Power 2026 U.S. Investor Satisfaction Study for do-it-yourself investing and was named the number one U.S. bank in Forbes' World's Best Banks list, according to SoFi. For a company still building household name recognition, those rankings carry real weight.

What Cramer's call and the SoFi CEO's buying pattern mean together

SOFI shares closed at $17.91 on June 18, up 2.81% on the day. The stock has returned 16.60% over the past year but remains down sharply year-to-date, against the S&P 500's 9.57% gain over the same period, according to Yahoo Finance.

SoFi is scheduled to report Q2 2026 earnings around July 28 — the next real catalyst, and one that will carry elevated expectations given the Q1 momentum.

Also Read: SoFi Technologies Inc. Latest News and Stories

My read on the setup is this simple. A CEO who has spent $2.25 million of his own money buying shares between $15 and $18 is communicating something that no earnings call script can fully capture.

Cramer's $18 call, repeated with conviction on national television, adds a layer of visibility to a stock that the broader market appears to be pricing without looking closely at the fundamentals.

The market may catch up before or after the Q2 report. But the people closest to this company have already answered it for themselves.

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