8chan/8kun QResearch Posts (18)
#20434695 at 2024-02-18 13:22:48 (UTC+1)
Q Research General #25069: Lazy Sunday Delta Day Edition
>>20434685
np
and he also lives in new york and refused to move to their headquarters in san francisco
https://www.forbes.com/sites/georgebradt/2019/11/01/the-extreme-red-flag-for-wells-fargo-onboarding-new-ceo-Charles-Scharf/?sh=427fc6057177
#20434610 at 2024-02-18 12:58:35 (UTC+1)
Q Research General #25069: Lazy Sunday Delta Day Edition
wells fargo bank
ceo and president, Charles Scharf
>On February 26, 2014 President Barack Obama announced his intent to nominate individuals to key Administration posts amongst which was Charles W. Scharf, Appointee for Member, President's Advisory Council on Financial Capability for Young Americans.
#18130583 at 2023-01-12 17:22:15 (UTC+1)
Q Research General #22227: QR Comfy Edition
Wells Fargo Is Shrinking Its Mortgage Business-Except Where It Isn't
Wells Fargo & Co. said Tuesday that it was dramatically narrowing its mortgage business to focus on existing customers. On Wednesday, it told others that it is open for new business.
The bank sent a notice to real-estate agents, home builders, nonprofits and others that refer mortgage business to Wells Fargo saying it wanted to clarify its message. "We're here to serve you and your homebuyers," it said. Referral partners are "the lifeblood of our Retail mortgage business," according to the message, which was reviewed by The Wall Street Journal. The notice suggests significant exceptions to the policy announced a day earlier-and just how tricky it is to scale back such a large business. The bank had said that going forward, it would primarily lend to people who already banked with Wells Fargo or who were among underserved groups ( i.e muh equity) Referrals are a common way mortgage bankers find new customers. Some home buyers that find Wells Fargo through a real-estate agent or builder may already be customers of the bank, while many aren't.
A spokeswoman for the bank, who confirmed the authenticity of the message, said in a statement: "Customers often come to us through trusted referral partners. As such, it was important that we communicated with those partners. We clearly articulated this go-forward strategy in the bullet points." "Wells Fargo continues to be committed to the Retail mortgage business along with our referral partners," the notice said. Wells Fargo, once the nation's largest mortgage lender, has been trimming that business after a string of scandals stemming from the revelation that it created perhaps millions of fake accounts. Chief Executive Charles Scharf began to reassess the business after he joined the firm in late 2019. Regulators have recently fined the bank for failures in its mortgage unit.
A market downturn has also limited demand for new mortgages. The bank has been cutting staff in its mortgage division and is expected to keep doing so. Wells Fargo was the third biggest originator of mortgages in the first nine months of 2022, according to industry research firm Inside Mortgage Finance. Wells Fargo also said that as part of its efforts to shrink its mortgage business, it would stop making loans through intermediaries and sell much of its mortgage servicing portfolio.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/wells-fargo-is-shrinking-its-mortgage-businessexcept-where-it-isnt-11673540971
ProTip: for all you worthless Real Estate Agents…Learn to code
#17550119 at 2022-09-20 17:23:51 (UTC+1)
Q Research General #21515: Potatus Runnin On Empty Edition
September 21, 2022
10:00 AM EDT
Holding Megabanks Accountable: Oversight of America's Largest Consumer Facing Banks
House Financial Services Committee
https://financialservices.house.gov/events/eventsingle.aspx?EventID=409764
https://www.c-span.org/video/?523025-1/banking-ceos-testify-industry-practices-oversight
Witness List
Andy Cecere, Chairman, President, and CEO, U.S. Bancorp
William Demchak, Chairman, President, and CEO, The PNC Financial Services Group
Jamie Dimon, Chairman and CEO, JPMorgan Chase & Co.
Jane Fraser, CEO, Citigroup
Brian Moynihan, Chairman and CEO, Bank of America
William Rogers Jr., Chairman and CEO, Truist Financial Corporation
Charles Scharf, President and CEO, Wells Fargo & Company
#16298898 at 2022-05-18 18:13:08 (UTC+1)
Q Research General #20618: Disinfo Board & Jankowitz BITE THE DUST? Edition
Wells Fargo CEO Warns 'No Question' Worst Is yet to Come for Americans
The CEO of Wells Fargo warned Tuesday that there is "no question" that the U.S. economy is going to get worse before it gets better.
"It's going to be hard to avoid some kind of recession," CEO Charles Scharf said during a Wall Street Journal event.
The Federal Reserve has already raised interest rates twice so far in 2022 in a bid to cool the economy to deal with rampant inflation. Federal data shows that inflation rose 8.3 percent from April 2021 to April 2022, reaching 40-year highs.
With the spike in interest rates and inflation, some analysts and economists have questioned whether the United States is careening toward a recession.
https://www.theepochtimes.com/wells-fargo-ceo-warns-no-question-worst-is-yet-to-come-for-americans_4472994.html?utm_source=partner&utm_campaign=TheLibertyDaily
yeah, no shit sherlock. and you're gonna make it as painful as possible while protecting "yours".
#10589130 at 2020-09-10 15:11:22 (UTC+1)
Q Research General #13550: [They] Will Let You Burn Edition
Citigroup's Jane Fraser to become first woman to head a Wall Street bank
Citigroup Inc (C.N) on Thursday named consumer banking head Jane Fraser to succeed Michael Corbat next year as the bank's chief executive officer, making her the first woman to lead a major Wall Street bank. Fraser, 53, has been a rising star in the financial industry, with a career spanning investment banking, wealth management, troubled mortgage workouts and strategy in Latin America - a key business for Citigroup. Her promotion to CEO was widely expected since being elevated to Citigroup president last year, and was celebrated as a step in the right direction for an industry that has few women or diverse executives in its top ranks. "Great news for the company and for women everywhere!" tweeted Bank of America Corp (BAC.N) operations and technology chief Cathy Bessant. "A big and fantastic moment."Citigroup shares were up 1% in morning trade.Indeed, Fraser joins a small group of women who have broken through the glass ceiling to reach the C-suite at major financial firms.
In addition to Bessant, there is Fidelity Investments CEO Abigail Johnson, JPMorgan's consumer lending head Marianne Lake and its finance chief Jennifer Piepszak, and Alison Rose, CEO of British bank NatWest. Fraser launched her career at Goldman Sachs in its mergers & acquisitions department in London and then worked for Asesores Bursátiles in Madrid. She joined Citigroup 16 years ago and is credited internally with helping the bank recover after the financial crisis, when it had to take $45 billion in taxpayer funds to survive. Through the years, she has run client strategy in Citi's investment bank, as well as its private bank, its mortgage business and its operations in Latin America, which accounted for 14% of annual revenue at the end of 2019. Her name was floated last year as a potential CEO candidate at Wells Fargo & Co (WFC.N), before the board settled on former JPMorgan executive Charles Scharf. In October, Fraser was promoted to the role of president and tasked to head its global consumer bank, a move that was widely seen as a precursor to her elevation.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-citigroup-ceo/citigroups-jane-fraser-to-become-first-woman-to-head-a-wall-street-bank-idUSKBN26124I
#10138897 at 2020-07-31 15:34:49 (UTC+1)
Q Research General #12976: Jordan Drops The Hammer On Fauxi Edition
Wells Fargo Sold Assets to Stay Under Fed Asset Cap as Markets Lurched
Wells Fargo & Co. unloaded hundreds of millions of dollars of assets during this spring's market collapse to stay out of trouble with the Federal Reserve. The Fed put limits on Wells Fargo's size as punishment for its 2016 fake-account scandal. Loans the bank made to customers drawing on credit lines in the pandemic's early days increased its size, and the bank scrambled to sell assets to get back in line, according to people familiar with the matter. One example: The lender sold assets tied to financing that helps blue-chip companies, including Walmart Inc., manage their cash flow and pay their suppliers, the people said. Wells Fargo ramped up its sales of these assets more than usual in the second half of March and early April during the financial markets' wildest days this year, amid the coronavirus pandemic, some of the people said.
It is a reminder that Wells Fargo, the fourth-largest U.S. lender, is navigating the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression with a major obstacle in its path. The growth restrictions have rippled across the bank, playing into its recent decisions to pare back in consumer and commercial lending, The Wall Street Journal has reported. When coronavirus was roiling the markets, companies collectively drew down hundreds of billions of dollars on their credit lines, driving up the loans on banks' books. This massive drawdown caused most banks' balance sheets to swell, but it put Wells Fargo in a particularly tough spot. The bank had to quickly unload assets to stay beneath the $1.95 trillion asset cap, the people said. Wells Fargo has narrowly stayed under the asset cap over the last two quarters, according to regulatory filings. It got a small reprieve in April, when the Fed lifted the restrictions so the bank could make loans through two federal small-business lending programs during the coronavirus crisis.
"We must prioritize balance sheet capacity, both assets and deposits, and there's certainly an opportunity cost for us in an environment like this," Chief Executive Charles Scharf said on July 14. Wells Fargo opted to sell assets tied to financing arrangements that companies use to pay their suppliers. In such deals, banks directly pay a company's suppliers, sometimes earlier than usual and at a discount to the invoiced amount. The bank makes money on the spread between what it paid the suppliers and what the companies later repay the bank. Banks like supply-chain financing because it can provide steady revenue from customers they already know and work with in other capacities. Banks often sell assets tied to these deals to other banks and investors, much like a syndicated loan. Wells Fargo still holds a large portion of these multibillion-dollar supply-chain financing facilities, including with Walmart, according to some of the people. A spokesperson for Walmart said it understands that "syndication and inviting other banks to participate in these programs is common."
During the spring market mayhem, Wells Fargo sold roughly 10% more receivables than it does on average, one of the people said. The bank didn't sell the assets at a loss, another person said. The supply-chain finance assets were good candidates to sell because they are relatively liquid, with a turnover of about 30 to 90 days, said some of the people. Freeing them up also doesn't much impact relationships with corporate customers, which are used to having a number of financial institutions hold some of their obligations.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/wells-fargo-sold-assets-to-stay-under-fed-asset-cap-as-markets-lurched-11596200731
#10032281 at 2020-07-21 15:09:54 (UTC+1)
Q Research General #12838: Tuesday Morning Melania Edition
Wells Fargo names BNY Mellon exec Mike Santomassimo as new CFO
Wells Fargo & Co. (NYSE: WFC) named a new chief financial officer on Tuesday.
Mike Santomassimo will start the role this fall. He was at New York-based BNY Mellon (NYSE: BK) for four years, including two-and-a-half years as CFO. Santomassimo also held top roles at New York's JPMorgan Chase & Co. (NYSE: JPM), where he worked for 11 years.
"Mike is a strategic-minded CFO with success in building and leading global finance teams that help drive business improvement," Wells Fargo CEO Charles Scharf said in a statement. "His experience as the CFO of one of the other seven globally systemic important banks in the U.S. puts him in a unique position to have immediate impact on Wells Fargo. He is action oriented and will be an important partner to me and our entire operating committee as we move our company forward."
Recommended
Santomassimo will replace longtime Wells Fargo executive John Shrewsberry, who is retiring from the bank. Shrewsberry's banking career spans nearly 30 years. He has been CFO at Wells Fargo since 2014, having previously led Wells Fargo Securities. Shrewsberry will work with Santomassimo during the transition. Scharf said Shrewsberry shared his intent to retire last year. He wanted to stay on as Scharf moved into the CEO role.
"It has been my privilege to be surrounded by a dedicated team and some of the brightest minds in financial services. I am proud of the progress we have made and the team we have built, and I have every confidence in the enterprise finance team to continue the good work we've begun," Shrewsberry said in a statement. Scharf is driving big changes since joining Wells Fargo last October. That includes refreshing much of the bank's leadership. Wells Fargo yesterday named a former Bank of America Corp. (NYSE: BAC) executive as its head of strategy, digital and innovation. Other big hires include: Scott Powell as chief operating officer starting last December; Muneera Carr as controller starting in January; and Lester Owens as head of operations starting this month.
Wells Fargo is still grappling with a 2016 fake-accounts scandal, where as many as 3.5 million accounts were created without customers' consent to meet steep sales goals. Scharf has said multiple times his first priority is to take steps to move the bank past its woes. Wells Fargo has operated under an asset cap since early 2018, part of its outstanding regulatory and legal issues. The bank is doubling down on risk management and revamping its structure for a more streamlined approach. Last week, Scharf also proposed cutting Wells Fargo's annual expenses by at least $10 billion. He noted too many management layers and duplicative processes across almost all lines of business. Cuts are also expected in retail operations.
San Francisco-based Wells Fargo posted poor second-quarter results last week. It posted a net loss of $2.38 billion, or 66 cents per diluted share, in the second quarter. Much of that loss was due to the $8.4 billion added to loan-loss reserves. Revenue also fell by 18% year over year.
Wells Fargo is the Charlotte area's second-largest bank based on deposits. It has its largest employment hub here with 27,500 employees.
https://www.bizjournals.com/charlotte/news/2020/07/21/wells-fargo-names-new-cfo.html
#9799281 at 2020-06-30 14:26:24 (UTC+1)
Q Research General #12542: Tuesday Morning Melania Edition
Wells Fargo to cut dividend while other big banks hold payouts steady
Wells Fargo & Co. said it expects to cut its dividend for the first time in more than a decade to preserve capital to weather the coronavirus pandemic.
The fourth-largest U.S. bank by assets said Monday it would cut its dividend from the 51 cents it paid in each of the four most-recent quarters. The bank said it would announce its payout when it reports second-quarter earnings on July 14. The other big U.S. banks- JPMorgan Chase & Co., Citigroup Inc., Bank of America Corp., Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Morgan Stanley-said they intend to hold their dividends steady. Still, this would be the first time any of the major banks reduced its per-share payout since the second quarter of 2009, when they faced an existential threat from the housing crisis
Banks are in a much stronger position now than they were during the past financial crisis. But with the outlook highly uncertain because of the pandemic-induced economic collapse, the Federal Reserve asked banks last week not to increase their dividends. The central bank said that in a worst-case scenario in which the economy takes a long time to recover, banks could face as much as $700 billion in loan losses. Wells Fargo executives hadn't committed to keeping the dividend intact, instead saying they would have to evaluate the Fed's guidance and the bank's own earnings power. The bank earned $653 million in the first quarter, down 89% from a year earlier. Chief Executive Charles Scharf has said earnings are expected to be similarly weak in the second quarter. In a statement Monday, he said he expects the bank will need to make a bigger increase in its allowance for credit losses than in the first quarter.
which if they do not use all those provisions set aside for losses it will take the amount unused and apply it directoy to it's balance sheet as earned income
The biggest banks all posted lower profits in the first quarter, and they socked away billions of dollars to deal with soured loans. But Wells Fargo's business lines were already struggling pre-pandemic; the bank's fake-account scandal of four years ago has crimped revenue growth and forced it to lean on cost cutting.
The potential for a dividend cut has been a concern among Wells Fargo investors in recent months. The bank's share price has more than halved in 2020, putting in the worst performance of the six largest banks. The KBW Nasdaq Bank Index was down 36% for the year and the S&P 500 was down 5.5%. The Federal Reserve also asked banks not to repurchase their own shares in the third quarter. Banks had previously committed to halting buybacks through the second quarter.
https://www.foxbusiness.com/markets/wells-fargo-to-cut-dividend-while-other-big-banks-hold-payouts-steady
#8791365 at 2020-04-14 18:51:05 (UTC+1)
Q Research General #11255: [RAT]atouille Not Baked Here Edition
Wells Fargo: Profit Drops 89% as it Girds for Soured Loans
Wells Fargo & Co.'s first-quarter profit sank 89% and the bank set aside billions of dollars to cover potential losses on loans to borrowers hurt by the coronavirus pandemic.
The San Francisco-based bank made $653 million in profit compared with $5.86 billion in the year-earlier period. Earnings per share were 1 cent. Analysts polled by FactSet had forecast 38 cents.
Revenue of $17.72 billion was down 18% from $21.61 billion a year ago. That missed analyst expectations of $19.4 billion.
The spread of the coronavirus hit banks hard in the first quarter as it forced much of the country to stay home and eliminated millions of jobs. Corporations drew down on bank credit lines and consumers asked to pause debt payments.
The bank has begun setting aside money to cover losses on loans to customers that were hurt by the coronavirus and may not be able to pay their mortgages or commercial loans. Wells Fargo said it has set aside $3.83 billion to cover potential loan losses, up more than $3 billion from the previous quarter. The bank raised its provision for credit losses in both its consumer and commercial divisions, reflecting expectations that the financial toll of the pandemic will be widespread.
Wells Fargo also said it took an impairment of $950 million on securities because of the economic and market conditions. Before the crisis hit, Wells Fargo was already dealing with a fake-accounts scandal that has battered its reputation. The bank last year hired a new chief executive, Charles Scharf, an outsider tasked with resolving outstanding regulatory issues. The bank's business lines have been lagging. Profit in each of its business units fell in the first quarter compared with the year-earlier period.
Wells Fargo has leaned heavily on cost cuts. Expenses in the first quarter totaled $13.05 billion, down 6% from $13.92 billion a year ago.
Still, it could be harder for banks to cut costs in the current health crisis. The coronavirus is forcing banks to spend money giving bonuses to front-line workers, deep-cleaning offices and setting up work-from-home capabilities.
In February, the bank reached a $3 billion settlement with the Justice Department and Securities and Exchange Commission, closing the door on a major portion of its legal problems.
However, the bank still faces regulatory problems, including a restriction on its growth. The Federal Reserve temporarily lifted a piece of that restriction after Wells Fargo said the sanction was forcing it to limit small-business loans. The bank's net interest income fell 8% to $11.31 billion. The Federal Reserve last month cut rates to near zero, and lower rates crimp what banks can charge on loans.
Non-interest income fell 31% to $6.41 billion. Card fees were down partly because the pandemic has reduced consumer spending, and mortgage banking income dropped because volatile and illiquid markets caused unrealized losses on some of its loans.
https://www.marketscreener.com/WELLS-FARGO-COMPANY-14861/news/Wells-Fargo-mpany-Profit-Drops-89-as-it-Girds-for-Soured-Loans-2nd-Update-30409091/
#8719146 at 2020-04-08 03:11:06 (UTC+1)
Q Research General #11164: Inside HRC's Head Edition
>>8719137
>>8719141
Thanks David Solomon CEO-GoldmanSachs, Brian Moynihan CEO-BofA, Gordon Smith Coprez/COO-JP Morgan Chase, Charles Scharf CEO Wells Fargo, Michael Corbett CEO-Citigroup, Al Kelly CEO-Visa, Michael Nebauch CEO-Mastercard, Noah Wilcox CEO chair-Grand Rapids State Bank & numerous others.
We're WAY AHEAD OF SCHEDULE -(w/5:5 handsig) paycheck protect prog been incredible.
Asking Congress for additional 500 billion for paycheck protect prog to keep Americans employed & lead to quick recovery, looking very bipartisan
(5:5 handsig)The plan is Amazing processing millions of loans, big banks are doing it, it's the big banks in U.S.A. doing it. (Is POTUS pointing us to culprits?)
Pivots immediately to WHO, U.S.A. gives [them] a lotta $$$, criticized decision China travel ban, they were wrong & have been wrong about a lotta things, didn't want to diverge, very China centric, we have to look into that so we're going to, we pay for majority of WHO $$$, more than the majority 58/$58 million small portion of what they've gotten over yrs, sometimes they get more than that, sometimes it's for programs that they're doing, much bigger #'s which's -(witches?) okay… if those programs are good we'll consent. Looking into WHO b/c they called it wrong, they called it wrong, they missed the call! -(all [they]'re comms are belong to US) could've called it much earlier, should've known, could've known, probably did know -(ingly commit treason) looking into that very carefully, putting hold on money spent to the W.H.O., put a very powerful hold on it -(frozen assets)
Pivots back to Big banks helping small businesses, small business will someday be big business, small b accounts for 50% of economic strenth, every1 rising to occasion.
Asks every American to use #AmericansInItTogether & share stories of how they're working together getting thru this ordeal -(tippy top keks POTUS!)
Our #'s stayed down b/c of Amazing Americans doing their part
Doing nothing would've been disastrous, so we closed it down, it was good moves, early China/EU moves good, made a lotta good moves -(5d chess style) shutting down big move, important to do to have far fewer deaths.
1st responders doing incredible job, mentions Construction wrkrs who going into hosp's to rebuild right next to ppl in trouble, they know nothing about it but getting wrk done to fix wing to get ppl in there.
Unlocking miracles of science, wish you could've heard yesterdays calls w/ med/bio co's coming up w/ cures. Working hard in UK.
Goes into ventilators again real quickly
3/4or5
#8377263 at 2020-03-11 15:52:23 (UTC+1)
Q Research General #10724: Wednesday BOOMS Abound Edition
Ex-Wells Fargo CEO referred to DOJ for alleged false statements to Congress
House Financial Services Chairwoman Maxine Waters asks feds to take 'appropriate' action
House Financial Services Chairwoman Maxine Waters referred former Wells Fargo CEO Timothy Sloan to the Department of Justice, claiming that Sloan made false statements to Congress in testimony last year.
Waters asked the DOJ to review Sloan's March 2019 testimony and take "appropriate" action. At the time, he testified that the bank was in compliance with consent orders with the government in the wake of a sales scandal.
Sloan stepped down from his post and retired last June.
Chair Elizabeth Duke and board member James Quigley both resigned effective Sunday after a congressional report, released last week, accused Wells Fargo of not living up to the terms of settlements in its sales scandal.
The bank has admitted that unrealistic sales goals led to millions of accounts being opened without customers' knowledge or under false pretenses.
Newly instated CEO Charles Scharf on Tuesday blamed the company's alleged consumer abuses on a "broken" culture and acknowledged the bank needs to do more to address its shortcomings.
Duke and Quigley said they worked to change the bank's culture and processes once they learned about consumers being taken advantage of.
"We believe that our decision will facilitate the bank's and the new CEO's ability to turn the page and avoid distraction that could impede the bank's future progress," Duke and Quigley said in a statement.
Former Bank of America chief financial officer Charles Noski was named the new board chair.
https://www.foxbusiness.com/markets/ex-wells-fargo-ceo-doj-referral
#8368071 at 2020-03-10 16:23:55 (UTC+1)
Q Research General #10713: Dem Platform Not So Silent Running Edition
https://apnews.com/ac276854d2334219d9592e0eaac64df8
New Wells Fargo CEO: Issues will not resolve until 2021
The third chief executive of Wells Fargo in four years appeared in front of Congress on Tuesday, saying that there's much the bank needs to do to fix its cultural problems, and isn't expecting it to be done until 2021.
Charles Scharf took over the troubled bank late last year. He replaced Tim Sloan, who resigned in March only a couple of weeks after being lambasted by members of Congress in his own hearing.
Unlike Sloan, Scharf is an outsider, previously holding the jobs of CEO of Bank of New York Mellon and Visa. Since taking the job, Scharf has been candid that the bank still have much work to do and has been trying to resolve all of the bank's legal problems.
"I am confident we can move this company in a significantly improved direction," Scharf said.
Wells Fargo's sales practices scandal is nearly four years old at this point, and the bank continues to remain mired in legal and regulatory trouble. The San Francisco-based company paid a $3 billion fine just last month for its illegal sales practices, on top of the roughly $1.2 billion in fines it had already paid. The bank remains under restrictions imposed by the Federal Reserve, not allowing Wells Fargo to grow any larger until its cultural problems are fixed.
Tuesday's hearing is the first of two that Rep. Maxine Waters, chairwoman of the House Financial Services Committee, is holding this week. The hearing on Wednesday was supposed to involve two members of Wells Fargo's board of directors, but those directors resigned on Sunday ahead of the scheduled hearing. Both Republicans and Democrats on the committee issued reports saying Wells' board was too willing to look the other way as the sales practices problems continued to grow.
#8356202 at 2020-03-09 12:35:20 (UTC+1)
Q Research General #10698: March 9th Morning Bake Edition
>>8356195
>https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2020/03/09/wells-fargo-board-members-resign-after-scathing-house-report/
Wells Fargo board members resign after scathing House report
Wells Fargo announced Monday that two of its board members, including its chairwoman, Elizabeth A. Duke, have resigned, following a scathing House report found that the bank's leaders were slow to address a series of consumer abuse scandals.
Duke and board member James Quigley were both featured in a more than 100-page report by the House Financial Services Committee that cited thousands of pages of documents, emails and internal notes to conclude the San Francisco-based bank had not properly addressed its problems.
Duke had served on the board since 2016 and was elected chair in January 2018, making her among the highest ranking women in banking. Quigley had been a board member since 2013 and is CEO emeritus at Deloitte, the consulting firm.
Charles H. Noski, the former chief financial officer of Bank of America, will become chair of the company's board.
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In 2017, Duke, then vice chair of Wells Fargo's board, questioned why the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) was including her on communications about actions the bank needed to take, according to the report. "Why are you sending it to me, the board, rather than the department manager?" she asked, according to notes taken by a CFPB official that were cited in the report.
A CFPB official later said Duke's response came as a "surprise," given that board members "would not typically object to receiving communication from a regulator," according to the report.
In another exchange, James Quigley, also a board member, resisted attending a meeting with one of the bank's regulators because he was overseas on vacation. "I am currently scheduled to be in the Galápagos Islands on these dates," he said in a 2019 email, according to the report. "The sense of urgency is surprising, are they politically trying to put an enforcement action in place in front of the hearing? "
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Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.), chair of the committee, had called on Duke and Quigley to resign last week.
House committee chair calls on two Wells Fargo board members to resign
Duke and Quigley were scheduled to appear before Waters' committee on Wednesday. Their resignations were effective on Sunday.
They said in a statement that their resignations would allow the bank's new CEO, Charles Scharf, to "turn the page" and "avoid distraction that could impede the bank's future progress."
"Out of continued loyalty to Wells Fargo and ongoing commitment to serve our customers and employees, we recommended to our colleagues on the Board that we step down from our leadership roles," the statement said.
Among the country's largest and most profitable banks, Wells Fargo has struggled to overcome a fake-accounts scandal, which ballooned as the bank admitted to other consumer abuses, including mistakenly foreclosing on hundreds of clients and repossessing the cars of thousands of others.
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Last month, the bank reached a $3 billion settlement with the Justice Department and the Securities and Exchange Commission, acknowledging that for more than a decade, thousands of employees falsified records, forged signatures and misused customers' personal information to meet unrealistic sales goals, opening millions of accounts consumers didn't want in the process.
Wells Fargo reaches $3 billion settlement with DOJ, SEC over fake-accounts scandal
The committee's report threatens to deepen the bank's problems. The report found that the bank repeatedly failed to live up to regulators demands that it repay consumers and weren't aggressive about addressing its cultural problems, despite public promises.
Scharf, the new CEO, is scheduled to appear before the Financial Services Committee on Tuesday, a potential turning point in the bank's efforts to repair its relationship with lawmakers and regulators.
#8210614 at 2020-02-21 22:22:21 (UTC+1)
Q Research General #10511: Big Mike's Meme Team & The Emperors New Clothes Edition
Wells Fargo to pay $3 billion to U.S. authorities to resolve probe into fake accounts
Wells Fargo & Co and one of its units will pay $3 billion to resolve criminal and civil probes into years of fraudulent sales practices, U.S. authorities said on Friday, wrapping up one of the last one major investigations looming over the bank. Wells Fargo and its North American subsidiary will pay the penalties to the U.S. Justice Department and Securities and Exchange Commission and enter in a deferred prosecution agreement lasting three years, the department said. The bank admitted that it pressured employees to meet "unrealistic sales goals that led to thousands of employees opening millions of accounts for customers under false pretenses or without customer consent often by misusing customers' identities" from 2002 to 2016, a senior Justice Department official said.
The agreement with the bank, the country's fourth largest U.S. lender, resolves the civil and criminal liability regarding Wells Fargo's fake accounts scandal. About $500 million of the penalties will go to the SEC to be distributed to investors, the Justice Department said.
Settling the multi-agency investigation marked an important milestone for Charles Scharf, Wells Fargo's new chief executive who joined the company from BNY Mellon in September shortly after the third anniversary of the scandal.
The Justice Department investigation was seen by analysts and investors as a key hurdle the bank had to clear before it could focus on its growth strategy, which includes convincing the Federal Reserve to remove a cap imposed on its balance sheet.
"Today's announcement should serve as a stark reminder that no institution is too big, too powerful, or too well-known to be held accountable and face enforcement action for its wrongdoings," Andrew Murray, U.S. Attorney for the Western District of North Carolina, said in a statement. The deal does not preclude civil or criminal charges against individuals. The senior department official declined to comment further regarding any ongoing probes.In a rare move, a U.S. bank regulator charged several former Wells Fargo executives for their roles in the sales scandal last month.
Wells Fargo had already paid out more than $4 billion in fines and penalties since the 2016 revelation that its sales practices encouraged employees to open potentially millions of unauthorized bank accounts in order to hit lofty sales targets. Since then, internal and external probes have uncovered issues in each of Wells Fargo's major business lines, including wealth management and the commercial bank. The fallout has also resulted in the Federal Reserve imposing an unprecedented growth restriction on Wells Fargo's balance sheet until it proves it has fixed its risk management and controls.
Over the past three years, Wells Fargo has taken various steps to fix its issues and rebuild trust with customers, investors and regulators. They include refreshing its board, centralizing risk teams and hiring an external chief executive. However, ongoing reputation issues and unresolved legal matters have weighed on the bank's stock price and profitability, which have lagged peers since 2016.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-wells-fargo-scandal-deal/wells-fargo-to-pay-3-billion-to-u-s-authorities-to-resolve-probe-into-fake-accounts-idUSKBN20F2KN
#7809591 at 2020-01-14 14:06:39 (UTC+1)
Q Research General #9995: By the Dawn's Early Light Edition
Wells Fargo quarterly profit slumps as legal costs mount
Wells Fargo & Co (WFC.N) reported a 55% slump in fourth-quarter profit on Tuesday, as the fallout from a sales scandal that erupted in 2016 drove the bank to set aside another $1.5 billion toward legal expenses. Shares of the bank fell about 3% to $50.50 in premarket trading.
The lender is operating under heavy regulatory scrutiny, including an unprecedented cap on its balance sheet by the Federal Reserve, as it tries to rebuild its reputation since it was revealed that the bank had opened potentially millions of bogus accounts. Since then, the fourth-largest U.S. bank by assets has paid billions of dollars in fines and penalties.
San Francisco-based Wells last year appointed Charles Scharf, a one-time Jamie Dimon protégé, as its new chief executive officer, to help it rebuild its reputation with customers, investors and regulators.
"Wells Fargo is a wonderful and important franchise that has made some serious mistakes, and my mandate is to make the fundamental changes necessary to regain the full trust and respect of all stakeholders," Scharf said in a statement. "Our cost structure is too high, and I believe there are many areas where we will be able to increase our rate of growth," he added.
Net income applicable to common stock fell to $2.55 billion, or 60 cents per share, in the fourth-quarter ended Dec. 31, from $5.71 billion, or $1.21 per share, a year earlier. Analysts had expected a profit of $1.12 per share, according to Refinitiv data.
Wells Fargo's net interest income fell 11% from a year earlier as the U.S. central bank lowered borrowing costs three times last year, in a bid to sustain the more than decade-long economic expansion amid the prolonged U.S.-China trade war. The lender's mortgage income, however, rose to $783 million from $467 million a year earlier, benefiting from the lower interest rates.
Mortgage applications have increased in most weeks since the Fed began reducing rates, according to a Mortgage Bankers Association index.
The bank's efficiency ratio was 78.6%, compared with 63.6% a year earlier. The ratio measures non-interest expenses as a percentage of revenue.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-wells-fargo-results/wells-fargo-quarterly-profit-slumps-as-legal-costs-mount-idUSKBN1ZD1MK
#7414437 at 2019-12-02 23:20:15 (UTC+1)
Q Research General #9482: Peach Mint drags on but JUSTIC coming per Q! Edition
Wells Fargo names Scott Powell as COO
Wells Fargo & Co said on Monday Scott Powell will become chief operating officer, the second external recruit to join the top ranks since Chief Executive Charles Scharf took over six weeks ago.
Powell, who worked with Scharf at Bank One and then JPMorgan Chase & Co, most recently was chief executive officer of Santander Holdings USA Inc as well as of Santander Consumer USA Holdings Inc.
Starting Dec. 9, Powell will report directly and will focus on Wells Fargo's relationships with regulators, which have been strained since the bank became tangled in a wide-ranging sales practices scandal in 2016.
Last month the bank hired another former JP Morgan executive and previous White House official, William Daley, to head public affairs.
hussein's COS who served for one year-largely responsible for helping/allowing JP Morgan(and other's) to run up the price of silver and slam it on the day-to the second- UBL was"killed".
Wells Fargo's board set a goal of hiring an outsider to lead the company following former CEO Tim Sloan's retirement to satisfy critics who claimed an insider could not transform the company's culture.
Scharf, who joined the company in October from Bank of New York Mellon Corp, is known to shake up leadership. Since he took over, general counsel and former interim CEO Allen Parker, and company veteran Avid Modjtabai have made plans to leave the company. The chief operating officer position has been vacant since October 2016, when Tim Sloan was promoted as CEO.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-wells-fargo-coo/wells-fargo-names-scott-powell-as-coo-idUSKBN1Y62DE
#6123635 at 2019-04-10 19:06:23 (UTC+1)
Q Research General #7831: The PANIC Watch Edition
U.S. lawmakers grill bank CEOs for the first time since financial crisis
(Reuters) - Chief executives of some of the largest U.S. banks appeared before Congress on Wednesday, giving lawmakers their first opportunity to grill the lenders since the 2007-2009 financial crisis.
Democratic lawmakers focused many of their questions on who the banks were doing business with, probing for answers about their Russian accounts and financing of gun manufacturers.
The tone, questions and players were distinctly different from a decade ago, when lawmakers focused on banks' ability to safeguard the financial system and avoid future bailouts. Among the CEOs on the panel, JPMorgan Chase & Co's Jamie Dimon was the only one who headed his bank before the financial crisis.
Still, bank executives got a few chances to flag hoped-for talking points like their positive contribution to the economy when Republican lawmakers quizzed them on more systemic issues.
Along with JPMorgan's Dimon, Bank of America Corp's Brian Moynihan, Citigroup Inc's Mike Corbat, Goldman Sachs Group Inc's David Solomon and Morgan Stanley's James Gorman all faced off against the House Financial Services Committee.
Ronald O'Hanley, CEO of State Street Corp, and Charles Scharf, CEO of Bank of New York Mellon Corp, the country's two largest custody banks, also appeared.
The hearing was led by Democratic Representative Maxine Waters and staffed with some high-profile freshman representatives like progressives including Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
(progressives….OMG)
Waters' first question, directed at three of the bank CEOs, was whether they had found suspicious activity within their banks related to Russian accounts.
Citi's Corbat declined to comment, citing an ongoing investigation into the matter. The Bank of America and Morgan Stanley CEOs said they had conducted internal investigations and did not find any suspicious activity.
Questions largely focused less on systemic risks and more on social issues like how banks are addressing wealth inequality by adjusting overdraft fees in checking accounts, and whether banks are extending loans to businesses that need them.
Democratic Representative Carolyn Maloney pressed JPMorgan's Dimon to commit to a policy that would reduce the bank's financing of gun makers. Citi and Bank of America last year said they would no longer provide certain banking services to gun manufacturers.
Some Republican lawmakers criticized such policies on Wednesday, with Representative Bill Posey cautioning banks against withholding financing from legal business and Representative Sean Duffy accusing Bank of America of denying Americans their Second Amendment rights.
The bank executives' prepared remarks focused on arguing that Wall Street has reformed the practices that fueled the crisis and stressing the contribution banks make to the broader economy.
Dimon said that JPMorgan "will never lose sight of what we learned Still, the bank has taken steps that went a long way to preventing another crisis, Dimon argued.
(fuck you too buddy!)
Since the crisis, the country's largest banks have added more than $800 billion in capital to bolster the financial system.
In the months leading up to the hearing, the banks also made a string of announcements to show how they are helping customers and communities.
Bank of America said on Tuesday it would raise its minimum hourly wage to $20 from $15 by 2021.
Last month, JPMorgan said it would no longer finance the private prison industry and would invest $350 million in job training programs.
Slideshow (12 Images)
Goldman Sachs has publicly set targets for hiring women and minority groups, a move Citigroup also made late last year.
Wells Fargo & Co was not present at the hearing since former CEO Tim Sloan resigned abruptly last month, two weeks after appearing before the same committee.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-house-banks/u-s-lawmakers-grill-bank-ceos-for-the-first-time-since-financial-crisis-idUSKCN1RM147
8chan/8kun QRB Posts (2)
#57015 at 2021-05-26 23:51:21 (UTC+1)
QRB General #231: Energized 45 Keeps On Ticking Edition
Senator Warren attacks JPMorgan's Dimon over 'baloney' overdraft fees
Progressive firebrand Senator Elizabeth Warren on Wednesday attacked JPMorgan Chase & Co (JPM.N) chief executive Jamie Dimon after the country's largest lender reaped $1.46 billion in overdraft fees during 2020 while borrowers were struggling to make ends meet amid pandemic lockdowns.
Warren told Dimon during a banking industry U.S. Senate hearing that the fees were especially egregious after federal agencies and Congress gave lenders a raft of regulatory breaks to allow them to preserve capital and better help customers. JPMorgan collected more overdraft fees than its immediate competitors, Warren said. "You and your colleagues came in today to talk about how you stepped up to help your customers during the pandemic. It's a bunch of baloney," Warren told Dimon in a fiery exchange during which the pair, at times, spoke over each other. Dimon responded that JPMorgan waived overdraft fees for customers who asked. When Warren asked Dimon if the bank would refund the fees, he flatly said, "No."
After the hearing, a spokesperson for the bank said in an email response to Reuters that in 2020 the bank waived fees on over 1 million deposit accounts, including overdraft fees, "no questions asked." The JPMorgan CEO testified alongside Bank of America Corp (BAC.N) CEO Brian Moynihan, Citigroup Inc (C.N) CEO Jane Fraser, and Wells Fargo & Co (WFC.N) CEO Charles Scharf, who also got heat from Warren for overdraft fees. Collectively, the four banks gathered $4 billion in such fees last year, Warren said. With their smaller retail businesses, Goldman Sachs Group (GS.N) CEO David Solomon and Morgan Stanley (MS.N) CEO James Gorman largely dodged Warren's wrath during their testimony.
Speaking to CNBC after the hearing, Warren, a former 2020 presidential candidate who rose to prominence during the 2008 financial crisis, said the banks had used the pandemic to "pump up their profits" and required aggressive regulation. The cost of overdrawing a checking account hit a new high in 2020, increasing to an average of $33.47, according to Bankrate, a consumer finance service. Banks say overdrafts are an important source of credit for customers, but consumer groups say the fees are usurious. The same six CEOs are due to appear before the House Financial Services Committee on Thursday as scrutiny of the industry grows under Washington's Democratic Party leadership.
Warren's attack on Dimon and overdraft fees will come as a blow to the industry which thought it had a good story to tell lawmakers after dishing out $69 billion of COVID-19 aid to struggling businesses and launching programs to tackle racial injustice and wealth inequality. But the Wall Street bosses frequently found themselves under fire from both sides of the aisle, with Democrats criticizing the banks for not doing enough to help everyday Americans, and Republicans wary of their growing support for liberal causes. Senator Sherrod Brown, a Wall Street critic who became chair of the Senate Banking Committee following Democratic gains in the 2020 election, also took a tough line, saying the banks' success navigating the pandemic was not enough. "Under the current system, Wall Street profits no matter what happens to workers, because those profits now come at the expense of workers," he told the CEOs in his opening remarks and implored them to justify their multi-million dollar paychecks and stock buy backs.
Republicans, on the other hand, criticized the banks for trying to drive social policies by limiting financing for fossil-fuel companies and gun manufacturers and by speaking out against a new Georgia voting rights law.
https://www.reuters.com/business/wall-street-ceos-tout-covid-assistance-diversity-efforts-before-us-senate-2021-05-26/
#46622 at 2021-04-19 17:34:47 (UTC+1)
QRB General #107: Habbenings Afoot Edition
Wall Street's Mega Bank CEOs To Be Hauled Before Congress in May; Nobody Will Say Why
We've been closely monitoring the Senate Banking and House Financial Services Committees for the past 15 years. We can think of no other time when the Committees issued a joint statement to announce they were hauling the most powerful men on Wall Street to testify, without offering a scintilla of information on the topic of the hearing.
The press statement simply indicated that the Senate Banking Committee would hold its hearing on Wednesday, May 26 at 10 a.m. and the House Financial Services Committee would hold its hearing the following day on Thursday, May 27 at 12 noon.
The announcement indicated that the following CEOs are scheduled to testify: Jamie Dimon of JPMorgan Chase; David Solomon of Goldman Sachs; Jane Fraser of Citigroup; James Gorman of Morgan Stanley; Brian Moynihan of Bank of America; and Charles Scharf of Wells Fargo.
The joint press release did not give a title for the hearings nor the topic for the hearings. There is nothing on the websites for either Committee that sheds any further light on the matter.
The only conclusion that we can draw is that more than a month before the hearings are set to be conducted, the Chairs of these two Committees - Senator Sherrod Brown (D-OH) and Maxine Waters (D-CA) - wanted to send a message to Wall Street's CEOs that they have them in their crosshairs.
If past is prologue, which we pray it is not, the hearings will use such a buckshot approach to questioning the witnesses that there will be no meaningful takeaway to the public from the hearings. In April of 2019, when CEOs from the same banks appeared before the House Financial Services Committee, the topics ranged from the banks' financing of fossil fuel companies; to "pink lining" (discriminatory practices against women); to racial preferences in hiring and promotion; to Jamie Dimon's failure to pay his bank tellers enough to raise a child without going into debt; and Wall Street's decades long practice of sending all customers and employee claims of wrongdoing into its own private justice system called mandatory arbitration - effectively closing the nation's courthouse doors and pitting David against Goliath in the pursuit of justice against the most rigged and historically corrupt industry in America.
https://wallstreetonparade.com/2021/04/wall-streets-mega-bank-ceos-to-be-hauled-before-congress-in-may-nobody-will-say-why/