Acting Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) Keith Noreika is deliberating whether to relax the sanctions placed on Wells Fargo, people familiar with the matter have said.
Restrictions on Wells Fargo were introduced after the financial company was hit with allegations of abusive sales practices last year. The company reached a $190 million settlement in September 2016 after admitting that its sales staff had opened about 2.1 million accounts without their customers’ consent – the current estimate of the number of accounts opened has reached 3.5 million.
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Following the discovery of the scandal, numerous Wells Fargo employees have had their severance payouts frozen as regulators investigated what roles those employees played in the scheme, if any.
As part of the deal with the OCC, incoming Wells Fargo executives may face vetting from the bureau while severance payouts must be cleared by the OCC and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC).
Since Noreika took the reins of the OCC in May, he has supported easing the restrictions imposed on Wells Fargo. Sources close to the matter told Reuters that Noreika wants to expedite the severance pay review process and is looking to waive the OCC’s check on incoming executives.
Noreika believes that too many innocent Wells Fargo employees are caught up in the reviews. Sources said that while the OCC has proposed speeding up the reviews, the FDIC has pushed back against the “artificial” deadlines to settle everything.
“The OCC has sought ways to make regulatory reviews more efficient (and) complete in weeks not months,” said OCC spokesman Bryan Hubbard.
FDIC has defended the pace of its audits, reasoning that there were complications.
“When delays occur, it is generally because the applying institution provided incomplete or inconsistent information,” FDIC spokeswoman Barbara Hagenbaugh said.
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