This final bullet point in this investor’s note on Seeking Alpha, from Matthew Finston, struck a nerve with me:
“Ocwen allegedly conducted morally reprehensible acts; but also looks undervalued.”
The revelation that the cost of business could be a boon to investors is not limited to Putnam Investments, which disclosed a 21% increase in Ocwen stake. Indeed, in recent days, shares in the nonbank servicer are up.
And while Putnam’s track record is not reason alone to follow suit, according to Finston, “Putnam has raised its stake 380% over the course of seven filing periods.”
Further on, he explains that Goldman Sachs [GS] also increased holdings of Ocwen by 95%, and called it a bad investment.
Finston also admits not being happy about buying Ocwen shares himself.
After such an excessive drop, Ocwen stock is now around 75% cheaper than a year ago and it seems no one can resist running to the nonbank mortgage servicer.
Ocwen is cheap in every sense of the word, especially when compared to Nationstar [NSM] and Walter Investment [WAC]. But, we've already seen that Ocwen probably has more than enough capital to see itself through this crisis. Click here for a chart showing how Ocwen is awash in cash, compared to Nationstar and Walter.
And it doesn’t matter. “Betting on Ocwen now is extremely risky, not to mention immoral,” Finston writes.
It’s hard to agree with both of those findings. Ocwen is not that risky, being so cheap.
And, to the charge of being immoral, when did stock investing become sanctimonious?
Finston is accurate that things will continue to be messy for Ocwen. Here's even a laundry list of all of the terrible things happening to Ocwen.
But let’s stop pretending anyone is beating themselves up about that.
