Wells Fargo illegally repossessed 413 service members’ cars

More than $24 billion in market value has been shaved off Wells Fargo since the scandal broke, said S&P Global Market Intelligence.

“Although it was not confirmed that all of these accounts were unauthorized, 217 incurred fees, and we chose to err on the side of the customer and issued these potentially impacted customers a refund, which on average was $25 per account”, said Ruben Pulido, vice president, corporate communications.

In an interesting display of bipartisan unity, both the House and the Senate took aggressive stances toward calling out Wells Fargo for the shady practices. About 5,300 Wells Fargo employees have been fired as a result of the scheme, which inflated sales numbers.

“After regulators discovered this widespread problem, Wells Fargo conducted an analysis that revealed that employees may have opened as many as 1.5 million checking accounts and obtained as many as 565,000 credit cards without customer authorization”.

On Thursday, it was the House Financial Services Committee’s turn to question Stumpf.

Last week, in Senate hearing, Stumpf said that he first learned about the fraud in late 2013, but wasn’t clear about exactly when.

In one tense exchange, Rep. Gregory Meeks, D-N.Y., said Stumpf was running a “criminal enterprise”, noting that the bank had been penalized multiple times during the CEO’s leadership, and should step down. He was chided for scapegoating lower-level employees — bank tellers, customer service reps and branch managers — rather than focusing on senior management’s failures. Elizabeth Warren get in all the shots against Wells Fargo, Chicago aldermen are set to consider banning from city business the bank that has become embroiled in a scandal over millions of phony customer accounts. That suit was settled earlier this month when Wells Fargo was fined $185 million by state and federal regulators. Stumpf said the bank’s efforts were costly even before any fines were levied or refunds paid. Previously, the bank paid $28 million after being accused of improper foreclosures past year.

“Borrowing a customer’s money without permission is not a sales practice violation, it’s stealing”, Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) said.

Thursday’s testimony follows a bipartisan tongue-lashing from the Senate Banking Committee on September 20, when Sen.

Wells Fargo, one of the biggest U.S. banking industries has recently come under fire after it was found guilty of fraud charges.

However, some congressman went further, saying executives including Stumpf could be criminally prosecuted.

“No, but.” Stumpf responded before being interrupted by Sherman, who said he understood that the answer was “no”.

When asked about his own personal future with the company, he deferred to either the bank’s board – which he chairs – or other actors.

“I led the company with courage”, Mr. Stumpf said, while admitting that the company “should have done more sooner” to address the problem of unauthorized accounts being created by employees in the names of real customers.