A Guide to All of Wells Fargo's Consent Orders
If investors are learning anything about Wells Fargo (NYSE: WFC), it's to listen to CEO Charlie Scharf's words carefully. As sentiment on the bank turned bullish and many, including myself, started to believe that the asset cap the bank has been operating under for more than three and a half years could be lifted in the near term, Wells Fargo received a fresh $250 million fine and a new consent order from the U.S. Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), which regulates national banks.
Additionally, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said publicly that the Fed would not hesitate to act if Wells Fargo did not fix its regulatory problems that ultimately lead to the bank's infamous phony-accounts scandal, in which employees at the bank fraudulently opened depository and credit card accounts for millions of customers without their authorization.
Scharf has not misled investors. On Wells Fargo's second-quarter earnings call, he called the remaining work on regulatory issues "significant." He also said there could be "setbacks, and progress will not be a straight line," a statement that proved true in Q3 and that Scharf has echoed on past earnings calls.
Source Fool.com
