Ocwen Financial Corp., one of the nation's largest mortgage servicers, said that New York’s Department of Financial Services "halted indefinitely" its agreement to buy the rights to service $39 billion of loans from Wells Fargo & Co., the Wall Street Journal reported today. The office of Benjamin Lawsky, superintendent of the New York regulator, has been investigating Ocwen since December 2012 over alleged abusive behavior toward homeowners. The regulator scuttled the Wells Fargo deal because it was concerned about Ocwen's ability to handle more loans given the alleged abuses. The market for mortgage-servicing rights shifted after the U.S. housing market collapsed in 2008. Mortgage servicing rights peaked at $11.19 trillion of loans in 2007, according to Inside Mortgage Finance. The figure stood at $9.9 trillion as of the fourth quarter of 2013.
