Mr Cooper Group Inc (COOP)

[David West]

Tax at Exercise

When you exercise warrants to buy the underlying stock, you pay the stated strike price to the issuing company. The difference between the strike price and the price of a share, minus the cost basis, is taxable income. Suppose you exercise warrants with a strike price of $30 per share to buy 100 shares of XY Company and you originally paid $500 for the warrants. Your total investment is thus $3,500. If the market price on the day of exercise is $50, the stock is worth $5,000 and the difference is $1,500. This $1,500 is taxable as ordinary income in the year of exercise. It is not a capital gain because you did not own the shares prior to exercising the warrants.

Capital Gains and Losses

You can sell the shares you acquire by exercising stock warrants immediately. If instead you decide to hold on to the stock, the exercise price becomes your cost basis. Any further gains or losses are capital gains or losses. If you sell the shares one year or less from the date of exercise, you have a short-term capital gain (or loss) that is taxable as ordinary income at the same rate as your other income such as wages or salary. If you hold the shares for more than a year after exercise, it’s a long-term gain or loss. Long-term gains are taxed at a maximum rate of 15 percent as of 2013.

http://finance.zacks.com/taxation-stock-warrants-7458.html

The above explanation is in line with what may be a concern of KKR, as they consider exercising their WMIH warrants.