Sep. 19 at 2:42 AM
$ABR Option (A): stop the divy and use free cash to buy back shares, and holding onto the
$0.5B in REO which is about 15 properties, a hard asset, until they get a return that maintains our book value. They have experience in doing this. Shorts would hit shares hard if they stop the divy but at a 0.37X book it is very cheap. Option (B): The back pocket trick that Ivan mentioned in the conference call was selling some REO and redirecting that cash to share repurchase - if they used SOME of the
$0.5B of REO money on shares (recognizing that they may not get all of the 0.5B value if they fire sale some assets).... they could retire a good chunk of the float. Option (C): Cut the divy, drop the share price, go on a massive buyback using REO assets and retire the float.