As its amount of new contracts purchased climbed, Consumer Portfolio Services generated a 75-percent increase in earnings per share during the first quarter.

CPS reported that its Q1 earnings totaled $6.7 million, or $0.21 per diluted share. Those figures are up from the company’s net income of $3.8 million, or $0.12 per diluted share, in the first quarter of 2013.

Officials indicated revenues for the first quarter came in at $68.1 million, an increase of $13.5 million or 24.8 percent, compared to $54.6 million for the first quarter of 2013.

Meanwhile, CPS acknowledged its total first-quarter operating expenses rose $8.3 million or 17.3 percent to $56.4 million, up from $48.1 a year earlier.

The company’s first-quarter pretax income soared to $11.8 million, compared to pretax income of $6.5 million in the first quarter of 2013, an increase of 80 percent.

During the first quarter, CPS purchased $189.9 million of new contracts compared to $173.4 million during the fourth quarter of 2013 and $180.1 million during the first quarter of 2013.

The company’s managed receivables totaled $1.295 billion as of March 31, an increase from $1.231 billion as of Dec. 31 and $968.5 million as of March 31 of last year.

Looking at other performance metrics, CPS noted that its annualized net charge-offs for the first quarter were 5.54 percent of the average owned portfolio as compared to 4.23 percent for the first quarter of last year.

Officials said their delinquencies greater than 30 days (including repossession inventory) represented 6.33 percent of the total owned portfolio as of March 31, as compared to 4.16 percent as of the same date last year.

As previously reported, CPS closed its first term securitization transaction of the year during March and the 12th transaction since April 2011.

In the senior subordinate structure, a special purpose subsidiary sold five tranches of asset-backed notes totaling $180.0 million. The notes are secured by automobile receivables purchased by CPS and have a weighted average effective coupon of approximately 2.51 percent. The transaction has initial credit enhancement consisting of a cash deposit equal to 1.00 percent of the original receivable pool balance. The final enhancement level requires accelerated payment of principal on the notes to reach overcollateralization of 5.00 percent of the then-outstanding receivable pool balance.

“The first quarter of 2014 was a good start to the year for us,” CPS chairman and chief executive officer Brad Bradley said. “We experienced a nice increase in our new contract purchases over the fourth quarter of 2013 and achieved continued earnings growth.

“In addition, we hit a milestone in one of our corporate objectives by fully repaying our senior, secured corporate debt,” Bradley continued. “This demonstrates our continued diligence in deleveraging our balance sheet. As we have discussed in the past, we feel this will position us well to navigate a wide variety of operating landscapes.”