Although we don't believe in timing the market or panicking over market movements, we do like to keep an eye on big changes -- just in case they're material to our investing thesis.

What: Shares of private mortgage insurer MGIC Investment (NYSE: MTG) got slapped around by Mr. Market today, losing as much as 13% in intraday trading after the company reported first-quarter earnings.

So what: It's not hard to see why investors are fretting -- MGIC's loss per share for the quarter was $0.17 against an expected $0.06 loss. The larger-than-expected loss came on revenues that were down from last year. A Reuters report also pointed out that net claims paid during the quarter rose to $687 million from $519 million last year, which Reuters suggested was a sign that the housing slump would continue to depress MGIC's business. Investors in competitors PMI Group (NYSE: PMI) and Radian (NYSE: RDN) obviously took the release as a sign of things to come as shares of both companies were down more than 10%.

Now what: While I am hardly a MGIC bull, I can't help but wonder whether the market overreacted a bit to today's news. Though earnings missed expectations, revenue was slightly ahead and trend-wise there appeared to be many measures moving in MGIC's favor. Total delinquent loans were down year over year, as were delinquency rates and new delinquency notices. Interestingly, during the first quarter, delinquency cures actually exceeded new delinquency notices. On the whole, MGIC's quarter may not be something to cheer about, but investors may want to take a closer look at the numbers (all of them!) before getting too depressed.

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