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Sell-side comes to New Residential defense
Apr. 20, 2017 4:42 PM ET|About: New Residential Investme... (NRZ)|By: Stephen Alpher, SA News Editor

Sucked into the Ocwen Financial vortex today, New Residential (NYSE:NRZ) was down as much as 13% before closing the regular session off 7.65%.

To review, Ocwen handles the servicing for a sizable number of MSRs owned by New Residential (New Residential takes care of the excess servicing). Presumably, New Residential could move servicing elsewhere were something bad to happen to Ocwen.

Citi came out in defense of NRZ shortly before the close, and now comes FBR's Jessica Levi-Ribner, telling clients to buy NRZ on the overreaction to the Ocwen news. It's possible, she says, New Residential has already begun transferring servicing rights to its own name, thus protecting it from counter-party risk.