Mr Cooper Group Inc fka COOP

[Mr_Simpson72]

Jay Bray CEO Nationstar

We plan to have additional meetings and provide a merger supplement over the coming week. We firmly believe that this transaction creates value for all shareholders and look forward to the closing in the second-half of this year.

Moving to financial highlights, I'm going to provide a summary view of our performance for the quarter, and then I will review the segment financial results, and then end with our views on 2018. For the quarter, we reported GAAP net income of $41 million or $0.41 per diluted share, and adjusted earnings of $42 million or $0.43 per diluted share. The performance was led by Servicing, which generated 5.8 basis points of profitability.

Our Servicing portfolio ended with $508 billion and 3.2 million customers. The business is poised to reach significant benefits of a rising rate environment. Originations recorded $34 million adjusted earnings on $5.2 billion funded buy-in for the quarter. In 2017, we made investments to expand our new customer acquisition purchase in corresponding channels which gives us more flexibility to take advantage of market conditions.

Xome posted $12 million in adjusted earnings, and has stabilized inventory levels for the Exchange segment through increased inflows from third-party clients. In April, we plan to start orders for our new field services business. Going forward in 2018, our net income will receive the benefit from the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. Our tax rate will go down from 37% to 24%.

After the closing of WMIH transaction, our shareholders will receive an even greater benefit, where the effective cash tax rate will go down to 3%. You can also see in our press release and slides that we have slightly modified our definition of adjusted pretax income. Previously certain GNMA early buyout activities were reflected in operating revenue, and these items have been reclassified in all periods. The effect of this change is a $4 million reduction in Q4 '17 adjusted pretax income versus what it would've been under the prior definition. The change has no impact on GAAP net income or cash flow in current or historical periods. But we may just change because we believe this approach provides a better approximation of our operating earnings.