House Financial Services Committee Chair Maxine Waters, D-Calif., says that the hundreds of millions of dollars Wells Fargo agreed to pay over its “myriad” offences have been insufficient to deter it from wrongdoing.
https://financialadvisoriq.com/c/3662194/470594/escalate_penalties_against_wells_fargo_maxine_waters
Don’t forget that the government created this mess. They created these mega-banks and they’re all too big to manage. That becomes glaringly obvious when one has a scandal the size of the fake account ridiculousness. If the fake accounts had been contained to the size of the organization before the WF/Wachovia merger it would have been a lot easier to clean up and punish at the level needed.
Taking large struggling or failing organizations and combining them ends up concentrating and magnifying their problems, not solving them. If banks weren’t the bedrock of the economy the government wouldn’t have thought twice about letting WF fade into the history books when the scope of the fake account scandal - and several others that came to light after. Instead they have to prop it up, pretend to be tough on getting things cleaned up and put out a few press releases now and then.
Even with the asset cap, a punishment unique to this bank, we still turn insane profits! The board just laments its not as insane as it could be if we could go out and get more business. Stock buybacks, the return of the dividends, highest paid banking CEO, on and on. If that doesn’t tell you how in-serious the government is about straightening this place out, nothing does.
Big shocker, she's in California, where WF has (smartly) begun its withdrawal.