Another Huge Bank Crime

[thriftyandboringinohio]

Breaking news about Wells Fargo Bank today.
The full story on CNN is here http://money.cnn.com/2016/09/08/inve...ees/index.html

Seems that Wells just fired 5,300 employees. That's not a typo, they fired more than five thousand employees.
These people had been creating phony accounts for real customers since 2011. They created over 1.5 million such phony accounts.
They did it to hit sales targets and make their bonuses.
The real customers were charged real fees on these phony accounts, which went largely unnoticed by the real customers.

If the terms "fraud" and "organized crime" mean anything at all, this is what they mean.

I think the rule of law is important, and we are losing our grip on it here in our FIRE sector.
These 5,300 appear to be thieves, and their managers appear to be organized crime bosses.
They need to be charged with crimes and got to jail if they are convicted.

The fact that there are over 5,000 people accused is irrelevant.
The fact that they did it for many years, routinely, and their boss knew is irrelevant.
The fact that these are nice middle class professionals including soccer moms and boy scout leaders is irrelevant.
Crime is crime and people need to go to jail.

I can' help thinking about the robo-signing debacle a few years ago where thousands of bank people submitted false and forged documents to courts and county clerks.
Nobody went to jail for that.

[Woodsman]

Re: Another Huge Bank Crime

Breaking news about Wells Fargo Bank today.
The full story on CNN is here http://money.cnn.com/2016/09/08/inve...ees/index.html

Seems that Wells just fired 5,300 employees. That's not a typo, they fired more than five thousand employees.
These people had been creating phony accounts for real customers since 2011. They created over 1.5 million such phony accounts.
They did it to hit sales targets and make their bonuses.
The real customers were charged real fees on these phony accounts, which went largely unnoticed by the real customers.

If the terms "fraud" and "organized crime" mean anything at all, this is what they mean.

I think the rule of law is important, and we are losing our grip on it here in our FIRE sector.
These 5,300 appear to be thieves, and their managers appear to be organized crime bosses.
They need to be charged with crimes and got to jail if they are convicted.

The fact that there are over 5,000 people accused is irrelevant.
The fact that they did it for many years, routinely, and their boss knew is irrelevant.
The fact that these are nice middle class professionals including soccer moms and boy scout leaders is irrelevant.
Crime is crime and people need to go to jail.

I can' help thinking about the robo-signing debacle a few years ago where thousands of bank people submitted false and forged documents to courts and county clerks.
Nobody went to jail for that.

It's "settled" and nobody is going anywhere. If Citigroup, and JPMorgan Chase can plead guilty to felony charges in connection with the rigging of foreign currency trading, if Barclays and RBS can plead guilty to felony charges in the same matter and if UBS can too, there will be no serious prosecutions. No jail time for any senior execs.

HSBC laundered drug money for the cartels; got off with a fine and nobody went to jail.


Twenty years ago almost every major firm on Wall Street, including JPMorgan, the predecessors of Citigroup, and UBS was charged with with fixing prices on the Nasdaq stock market. No criminal charges were brought.


They own the regulators and the prosecutors so have total impunity. And now that they've bought themselves a president in HRC, they should sleep like babies.

[Fiat Currency]

Re: Another Huge Bank Crime

It's "settled" and nobody is going anywhere.

Not only that, of the $190M fine, only $5M will go to the customers. No offence to my neighbours in the South, but I can barely read the news anymore. There is so much lying, corruption and malfeasance now it is accepted as normal. When these admissions of crime happen - the entire Board, C-suite and every Sr. VP should be made to resign or face criminal charges - no exceptions. I doubt Buffet's name will even come up.

[shiny!]

Re: Another Huge Bank Crime

the term "Bank Robber" sure doesn't mean what it used to mean.

[BillBoard]

Re: Another Huge Bank Crime

the term "Bank Robber" sure doesn't mean what it used to mean.

I read the article and became physically sick. I literally puked, don't know where such extreme reaction came from.

[Woodsman]

Re: Another Huge Bank Crime

I read the article and became physically sick. I literally puked, don't know where such extreme reaction came from.

Maybe it was in realization that we live in the best of all possible worlds for the top 1%, where no unseemly questions about who knew what when are pursued seriously?

There is no way to defend the lack of punishment of executives in a fraud of this scale that extended over five years. Either the execs were in on it, or somehow lower level employees cooked this up and were able to hide it from them. The latter would represent a massive control failure. There is no way the Wells Fargo leadership can have it both ways. Either they were in on the ripoff or they were not even remotely on top of what was happening. But regulators and prosecutors gave the executives a get out of jail card and they got away with crooked conduct that unquestionably was their responsibility. That sure makes me want to puke-up my Egg McMuffin.

For what's a $185 million to them when they just posted second quarter profits of $5.6 billion? A joke, right? Just like the stand-up routine CEOs perform, as justification for their stratospheric pay, when claim they are responsible for every aspect of corporate success yet are never challenged when they descend into the ritual “I know nothing” denials over misconduct that took place on their watch.

If anyone wants to understand why non-traditional candidates like Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump are so popular, it’s the refusal of the elites to police their own ranks while applying the full weight of the law against everyone else for any infraction, regardless of scope or intent.

Even in a year when the Democrats are under pressure and there have been more and more calls for individual bank executives to be punished, the powers that be can’t bring themselves to go against their friends and benefactors. You, however, are always fair game.

[thriftyandboringinohio]

Re: Another Huge Bank Crime

...what's a $185 million to them when they just posted second quarter profits of $5.6 billion?..

My arithmetic says that's a 3% reduction in one quarter's profit. If the year is consistent, the fine amounts to less than 1% of profits for the year.
Like you say, the fine is negligible.

... the refusal of the elites to police their own ranks....

That seems to be the root cause of many of America's troubles. The top ranks in business and government are filling up with dull, lazy, and inattentive people. Slackers and dullards who pay attention to nothing but their own pockets and perks. Folks who know nothing much except they must receive glory and money.
A fish rots from the head down.

[Chris Coles]

Re: Another Huge Bank Crime

That seems to be the root cause of many of America's troubles. The top ranks in business and government are filling up with dull, lazy, and inattentive people. Slackers and dullards who pay attention to nothing but their own pockets and perks. Folks who know nothing much except they must receive glory and money.
A fish rots from the head down.

You can say the same about other nations; the US is not alone by any means.

[thriftyandboringinohio]

Re: Another Huge Bank Crime

The top executive for the business unit that committed these acts has resigned and received a $125 million parting bonus.

Full story here at Forbes: http://fortune.com/2016/09/12/wells-...rrie-tolstedt/

The fine was not much more than the going-away bonus.
No jail time. Instead a nine-figure bonus. Good work if you can get it.

[GRG55]

Re: Another Huge Bank Crime

The top executive for the business unit that committed these acts has resigned and received a $125 million parting bonus.

Full story here at Forbes: http://fortune.com/2016/09/12/wells-...rrie-tolstedt/

The fine was not much more than the going-away bonus.
No jail time. Instead a nine-figure bonus. Good work if you can get it.

Unbelievable. Simply unbelievable.
The FIRE economy lives on.
And people think Martin Armstrong is crazy for stating the entire system has to blow up and collapse before there will be any hope of constructive change...

[jk]

Re: Another Huge Bank Crime

The top executive for the business unit that committed these acts has resigned and received a $125 million parting bonus.

that'll show him a thing or two!

[dcarrigg]

Re: Another Huge Bank Crime

The top executive for the business unit that committed these acts has resigned and received a $125 million parting bonus.

Full story here at Forbes: http://fortune.com/2016/09/12/wells-...rrie-tolstedt/

The fine was not much more than the going-away bonus.
No jail time. Instead a nine-figure bonus. Good work if you can get it.

That's it. I'm taking up track suits, gold chains and cigars. Gonna move to Youngstown. Pick up some nice multifamily housing for $20 or $30k. Thrifty, you got a place for me to stay while I get my act together? Anyone else, wanna buy into the next real estate empire? $500 per share. 10 shares oughta get me a down payment on a 6 unit to start. Already got the Louisville Slugger. I'll find me a couple kids with the entrepreneurial spirit and offer them unpaid internships in "Real Estate Management." Better yet, I'll hire me some "independent contractors," that way there they can buy their own bats and glocks. Let them keep 5% of the rent or something. Make them answer calls and mow lawns. Let them contract that out to 10 year olds for all I care. In fact, I'll suggest they do without putting it in writing, that way I can feign ignorance. Then I can process it all through an iPhone app. We'll call it Hyper-Mega-RentX.Then we'll have somewhere in the terms of service include all sorts of hidden fees and interest penalties on the renters. Make December a "peak month" and charge them double for Christmas. F-it, even better, only offer rents at variable hourly rates they have to check real-time online, and get them to sign up for two-year minimum contracts with $5,000 separation penalties. That way there, there's no telling how much it might cost them. Then I can buy up block by block, west to east, and squeeze the rents as deep as they'll go.

It'll still be more honest than Wells Fargo or Uber or Bear Sterns or Countrywide or any of these other scum-suckers. And we're guaranteed to make bank.

Hell, we know playing by the rules, offering a good product or service, and working hard doesn't pay anymore.

So who's in?

[lektrode]

Re: Another Huge Bank Crime

That's it....
...
.. buy up block by block, west to east, and squeeze the rents as deep as they'll go.

It'll still be more honest than Wells Fargo or Uber or Bear Sterns or Countrywide or any of these other scum-suckers. And we're guaranteed to make bank.

Hell, we know playing by the rules, offering a good product or service, and working hard doesn't pay anymore.

So who's in?

+1
i'm 'with him'

[lektrode]

Re: Another Huge Bank Crime

Unbelievable. Simply unbelievable.
The FIRE economy lives on.
And people think Martin Armstrong is crazy for stating the entire system has to blow up and collapse before there will be any hope of constructive change...

and to think some people still believe that hitlery is NOT in the back pockets of the banksters...

the DEEP STATE QUEEN of the banksters.

what i REALLY want to know?

where in hell are the GD 'regulators' ?!!!!!

when all thru 2008-09 - esp 2008 - all we heard from the lamerstream media chattering class was the biggest wipeout since the 1930's was ALL THE FAULT OF THE BUSH ADMINS REGULATORS ? - who 'failed to rein-in the mortgage scammers' - meanwhile we had the Prime Douchebags of the political class arguing "..for using the government's authority to force lower underwriting standards in the business of housing finance.." was a good idea and that even "...rolling the dice..." as the imbalances built up was somehow prudent? (and i wont even get into how that particular Douchebag is proof that... uhhh... men engaging in... uhhh... risky behavior causes brain damage, he's the living proof...)

but thanks to the dept of juicetess, even when they are caught red, or rather BLUE handed, they get to buy a get-out-of-jail FREE card - and walk, neither admitting nor denying anything ever happened?

meanwhile they just continue to run-down the clock... AFTER they let all the big fish walk....

and what do we get out of their propaganda machine? (aka the Clinton News Network, made up of CNN, ABC, CBS, NBC, Huffpo, WaPo, et al, ad nauseum):



that is when they arent BULLHORNING the donalds latest faux pas

or running blocking-cover for The "recovery"

[thriftyandboringinohio]

Re: Another Huge Bank Crime

I was annoyed by the wording in the official Wells Fargo statement:

"We regret and take responsibility for any instances where customers may have received a product that they did not request," Wells Fargo said in a statement.

They make it sound like they gave their customers free washing machines and iPads by mistake, implying it's unfair Wells Fargo got that slap on the wrist.