Black Knight’s stock plunged more than 3.5% Monday after a Politico report said that the Federal Trade Commission would file a lawsuit to stop the transaction with Intercontinental Exchange. ICE Mortgage Technology’s leadership will be changing on March 1. Timothy Bowler, president of ICE Benchmark Administration, will replace Joe Tyrrell. The report stated that the FTC would file its suit in March. “If the FTC acts, it will reflect industry leaders, academics, policy experts, and industry leaders throughout mortgage finance sector,” stated David Stevens, CEO of Mountain Lake Consulting, who was also the Federal Housing Commissioner under the Obama Administration. He also said that the FTC would file a lawsuit sometime in March. The Community Home Lenders of America is an association of small and mid-sized mortgage banks. “The FTC’s blocking of the ICE purchase Black Knight would be a victory both for consumers and mortgage banks, who would benefit by preserving more competition in mortgage software services and making it harder for anticompetitive practices such as tying to be imposed,” Scott Olson, CHLA Executive Director, stated. Others are concerned about ICE Mortgage Technology monopolizing the entire process, from application through servicing and secondary marketing, and by owning the most popular software in each area. They often say that selling Empower would not solve their problems. Black Knight closed trading Monday at $60.85 per stock, down $2.23 compared to Friday. That is a far cry from the $85 per share cash and stock offer from Intercontinental Exchange when the deal was announced in May 2022.Over 2.9 million Black Knight shares were traded on Monday, well above its average volume of 872,401, according to Yahoo Finance.Intercontinental Exchange also closed lower, at $101.51 per share, down $1 or 0.98% from Friday. Black Knight and the FTC didn’t respond to a request for comment.