Fidelity National Information Services Inc., a bank technology provider set to spin off this week from its majority owner, Fidelity National Financial Inc., will join the Standard & Poor's 500 stock index.
Standard & Poor's Corp., a unit of McGraw-Hill Cos. of New York, said Thursday that Fidelity National Information will replace the forest products company Louisiana-Pacific Corp. in the index after the market closes Nov. 9.
Louisiana-Pacific will take the technology vendor's place in the S&P MidCap 400, the agency said.
Fidelity National Financial will be dropped from the MidCap 400 index, because it is selling itself to Fidelity National Information as part of a corporate reorganization expected to be completed Nov. 9. The bond fund manager Nuveen Investments Inc. will take Fidelity National Financial's place on the index.
S&P did not discuss its plans for the title insurer Fidelity National Title Group Inc., which was spun off from the holding company last month and would take over the Fidelity National Financial name at the end of the reorganization.
The Fidelity companies, all with headquarters in Jacksonville, Fla., began the reorganization in April with a goal of improving their stock prices. That strategy may bear additional fruit for the technology vendor, because its shares would be in demand by mutual funds and other investors whose holdings replicate the S&P 500.
William P. Foley 2nd, the chairman of all the Fidelity companies, has been the architect of their corporate strategy since the title company acquired Alltel Corp.'s bank-technology unit in 2003.
Fidelity National Information has agreed to pay Mr. Foley an annual base salary of $500,000, with an annual 250% cash bonus for achieving targeted results, though the bonus could vary slightly.
Fidelity National Financial said that last month it paid a $19 million bonus to Mr. Foley, and smaller amounts to other executives, for shepherding the reorganization.
Late Thursday, Fidelity National Information also announced that it has acquired Watterson Prime LLC, a Bellevue, Wash., provider of outsourced loan due diligence services to Wall Street investors and other financial institutions that invest in and securitize mortgages.
The transaction closed Wednesday, the buyer said, though it did not disclose the price.
Fidelity National Information said it will integrate Watterson's service with its other mortgage service offerings, such as the FIS Hansen Quality HQ Score, a collateral risk score used by Wall Street investors.
