Lender Processing Services shares tank after Nevada sues co

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(Global Markets) - Lender Processing Services' (LPS.N) shares fell as much as 16 percent on Friday, after the state of Nevada sued the mortgage servicing provider for allegedly engaging in deceptive practices against consumers.

The lawsuit filed on December 15 in the 8th Judicial District of Nevada includes allegations of widespread document execution fraud, improper control over foreclosure attorneys and the foreclosure process, and misrepresentations about LPS' fees and services.

"Former employees and industry players describe LPS as an assembly-line sweatshop, churning out documents and foreclosures as fast as new requests came in and punishing network attorneys who failed to keep up the pace," Attorney General Catherine Cortez Mast said in a statement on her website. (here)

When contacted, Lender Processing Services said it had no immediate comment to make on the matter.

On November 17, two of LPS' employees were indicted for allegedly supervising a robosigning scheme on documents that were used to initiate foreclosure on local homeowners.

In May, Attorneys general in California and Illinois had subpoenaed Lender Processing Services and peer Nationwide Title Clearing Inc as part of probes into alleged "robosigning" in the mortgage servicing industry.

Shares of the company were trading at $14.59 on Friday on the New York Stock Exchange.

(Reporting by Satyanarayan Iyer and Arnav Das Sharma in Bangalore; Editing by Sriraj Kalluvila)