- Deposits flowing out due to customers seeking a higher yield elsewhere.
- Unable to grow itself organically.
- The executives are scrambling, pulling out all the stops on moves which seem to come out of nowhere. “If you can't dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with bullsh-t.”
- C-Suite paying themselves handsomely, despite ongoing failures, and while laying off tens of thousands of employees
- Cheapskates on many expenses, then spending wildly on other arrogance-based projects.
- Rising interest rates and inflation leading to large loan losses. Commercial real estate declining.
- Taking advantage of minority homeowners.
- The lack of ethics leading to multiple lawsuits for failing to conduct suitable due diligence and “failing to do right by customers”. Clear lack of ethical behavior by executives.
- Bringing in a “politically connected” executive as a Hail Mary to grease palms.
- Incentive structures or unwritten rules of conduct make it unpopular to offer a dissenting view
- Wachovia was said to have “gradually narrowed its range of decision makers, making it fragile in withstanding external pressures.”
- In a post- collapse interview, a former Wachovia employee said, “Over time, something happened that began to turn healthy internal cooperation into selfish, more sinister efforts to grab power. At times it felt like we were more caught up in competing with ourselves than with rivals in the marketplace. Some leaders worried about their legacies, or succession plans. More unfortunate were many leaders who had been loyal to the company and to certain executives for so long who found themselves suddenly sidelined, without warning or explanation. The sense that one day you’re in and the next day you could be out breeds a cautious, fear-filled environment.”
- Wachovia was said to have suffered from dreadful management, poor strategic decisions, terrible timing, and delusional decision making.
5 replies (most recent on top)
None of your bullets matter because they failed due to the Golden West acquisition. Wachovia loved acquisitions and it caught up to them.
First Union was a complete joke. The original Wachovia was destroyed by First Union.
It is the tradition of this bank to continuously cook up the books. Tolstedt and others were following that tradition. She just happened to get caught.
Do u think Wellsfargo is cooking up the books? Wachovia did it. May be other banks as well. No one is borrowing
Where’s Mike Rice when you need him.