Fed Takes Pathbreaking Action Against Wells Fargo

Order Enhances Role of Compliance and Other Control Functions at Nation’s Largest Banks Earlier this month the Federal Reserve Board issued a cease-and-desist order finding that, in light of “pervasive compliance and conduct failures” involving violations of consumer protection laws, Wells Fargo was not meeting its regulatory expectations. The controversy began, as discussed last year in this…

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Wells Fargo’s Foreign Exchange Operations Under Investigation for Over-Charging: Sound Familiar?

Much has been written on Wells Fargo’s continuing compliance woes, including by this blog last year on its unauthorized retail account opening scandal. The most recent compliance issue involves the bank’s foreign exchange (forex) desk, where it is accused of overcharging mid-market corporate clients. To be sure, overcharging for forex transactions has resulted in multibillion dollar fines…

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Wells Fargo’s fraudulent account openings: What are the (initial) risk management lessons?

It is intriguing that the intense level of media attention and Congressional furor over Wells Fargo’s fraudulent account opening scandal may equal or exceed that involving the LIBOR and Forex rigging scandals that resulted in billions of dollars of fines. The financial institutions that settled the LIBOR cases had allegedly manipulated the benchmark interbank interest…

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