Consumer banking giant Wells Fargo agreed to pay $3.7bn to settle a laundry list of charges that it harmed consumers by charging illegal fees and interest on auto loans and mortgages, as well as incorrectly applied overdraft fees against savings and checking accounts.
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) on Tuesday ordered Wells to repay $2bn to consumers and enacted a $1.7bn penalty against the bank. It’s the largest fine to date against any bank by the CFPB and the largest fine against Wells, which has spent years trying to rehabilitate itself after a series of scandals tied to its sales practices.
The bureau says the bad behavior by the bank affected more than 16 million customers. In addition to improperly charging its auto loan customers with fees and interest, in some cases the bank wrongfully repossessed borrowers’ vehicles. The bank also improperly denied thousands of mortgage loan modifications to homeowners.
“Wells Fargo’s rinse-repeat cycle of violating the law has harmed millions of American families,” said Rohit Chopra, director of the CFPB, in a statement.
Wells Fargo has been repeatedly sanctioned by US regulators for violations of consumer protection law going back to 2016, when Wells employees were found to have opened millions of accounts illegally in order to meet unrealistic sales goals.
Since then, Wells executives have repeatedly said the bank is cleaning up its act, only to have the bank be found in violation of other parts of consumer protection law, including in its auto and mortgage lending businesses.
Back in 2018, Wells paid a $1bn penalty to cover widespread consumer law violations. That, at the time, was the largest fine to date against a bank for consumer law violations.
The bank had previously signaled to investors that it was expecting additional fines and penalties from regulators. The bank set aside $2bn in the third quarter to cover potential regulatory matters.
Wells remains under a Federal Reserve order forbidding it from growing any larger until the Fed deems that its corporate culture problems are resolved. That order, originally enacted in 2018, was expected to last only a year or two.
In a statement, the Wells Fargo CEO, Charles Scharf, said the agreement with the CFPB is part of the effort to “transform operating practices at Wells Fargo and to put these issues behind us”.