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WHY RISK LOSING?

WELLS FARGO SUBMITTED FAULTY DOCS TO HUD! IS THERE ANYTHING YOU DIDN'T STEAL?

VIOLATED THE FEDERAL
FALSE CLAIMS ACT

Mortgage lenders like Bank of America and Wells Fargo are fighting the fight on all fronts, with the latest being False Claims Act violations. Here's what to look for in any settlements.

By Abigail Field, contributor

FORTUNE -- The trouble for America's largest mortgage lenders just keeps mounting. How much will it cost them to make it all go away?

Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase (JPM), Wells Fargo (WFC), Citigroup (C) and Ally Financial violated the federal False Claims Act, according to officials briefed on federal investigations who spoke to the Huffington Post. The unnamed officials say the banks submitted faulty documents in seeking federal reimbursement from the Federal Housing Administration homes they'd foreclosed on.

Flickr

This comes on top of countless other legal investigations the banks are facing by federal and local regulators, including a wide-ranging probe by all 50 state attorneys general, which also focuses on shoddy mortgage practices. The Department of Housing and Urban Development reportedly has the goods to nail the five banks for their scam and it's now up to the Department of Justice whether or not to sue.

If the government sues and wins, the banks will face massive, mandatory penalties. Each guilty bank would potentially owe a fine equal to every falsely-paid tax dollar times three, plus thousands more for each careless, defaulted mortgage. Guilty banks would also be banned from ever doing business with the government again. So it's not surprising that a settlement would be far more likely, according to Patrick Burns of Taxpayers Against Fraud, a False Claims Act advocacy group.

If HUD really did do audits that "read like veritable indictments of major lenders," according to HuffPo's sources, will the government lean hard on the banks, the way prosecutors lean on defendants they want to flip into witnesses? The proof will be in the final settlement, and in who signs on to it.

The first signal will be the settlement's scope: How many possible prosecutions did the government drop in exchange for the punishment the banks accept? How much peace do the banks and their executives get to buy?

One measure of this will be which attorneys general agree to the deal. Burns notes that a bank like Bank of America (BAC) is much too powerful for most states to sue individually. BofA alone could bankroll an army of lawyers that vastly outnumbers the government's attorneys. However, certain states have the power to make at least a fair fight on their own: California, New Jersey, Florida, Texas, and most of all, because it has special, powerful laws, New York. Getting these states to sign off on a settlement will not be easy. In particular, New York attorney general Eric Schneiderman seems serious about investigating wrongdoing, and surely won't be bought off cheaply.

Who will be held accountable?

The next signal will be the size of the penalties, and who pays them. Given the scale of the wrongdoing and the possibility of a massive verdict, how much did it cost the banks to buy the peace? The largest number being floated so far is $30 billion. While hefty, that's still not enough to make a meaningful dent in the banks' balance sheets. Such a sum would hardly equate to accountability for all the pain the banks' practices have caused.

Another marker of the government's seriousness will be whether or not any of the fine is defined as a criminal penalty. Although the False Claims Act itself is usually used for civil penalties, the same facts can give rise to criminal charges. While criminal penalties wouldn't necessarily change the amount of the fine, seeing the banks admit criminal guilt would be deeply satisfying to the countless homeowners who felt violated by the banks' practices.

And what about individuals who may be culpable? The government will have leaned hard if any of the executives who reaped riches on the mortgage boom have to pay part of the price. Given the stunning lack of prosecutions of the banks' leaders, any settlement that buys much peace ought to make those deep pockets much shallower.

Of course, criminal prosecutions could still happen. Sure, the fraud is complex, but we convicted Ken Lay and Jeffrey Skilling of Enron, in really complex frauds. If HUD, in a matter of weeks, can gather enough evidence to bring False Claims charges, surely a thorough investigation could send people to jail. Burns is too much of a cynic to hope for that, however, noting that the banks are too big to fail, and the executives "too rich and educated to jail."

A final, and crucial signal of how hard the government leaned on the banks will be the change in practices going forward. Will the banks be allowed just to promise to play nice, and swear they'll own up if they don't? Or will a settlement require meaningful changes to how the banks originate, service, modify and foreclose on loans backed up by real oversight and penalties?

Unless the Republicans in the Senate stop their efforts to weaken the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the only hope of ending mortgage lender and servicer abuse lies with a global settlement.

The Feds ought to wield the big False Claims stick with all the force that the banks have earned – whatever it takes to coerce some real change.

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Lawsuits Against Wells Fargo

Lawsuits Against Wells Fargo Bank - US Wells Fargo Sucks DON'T BE STUPID. MOVE YOUR MONEY. LEAVE WELLS FARGO NOW.

Here is a page listing a few of the lawsuits filed against Wells Fargo (WFC) in the United States. In addition, when Wells Fargo acquired Wachovia Bank at the end of 2008, they became responsible for its obligations. This page is intended as a supplement to these pages -Wells Fargo Sucks Wells Fargo Inherited IRA Transfer Failure Lawsuits Filed Against Wells Fargo in Santa Cruz, CA

Date	State Filed	Plaintiff	Case Type	. Result
May 4, 2011	Tennessee	City of Memphis, TN Memphis and Shelby counties	Predatory Mortgage Lending	Wells Fargo Motion to Dismiss denied "Plaintiffs have adequately pled"
Apr. 29, 2011	Nevada	Signature Developers Elko, NV	Illegal Foreclosure - Riverside Condominiums	WF must pay $9.5 Million $5.5 M for Fraud $2.5 M for Negligent Represent. $1.5 M for Breach of Contract
Apr. 25, 2011	Maryland	City of Baltimore	Predatory Lending	Wells Fargo Motion to Dismiss denied Case will proceed
Apr. 15, 2011	New York	Wells Fargo vs. U.S.	Abusive Tax Shelters	Wells denied $115M in tax deductions for 2002
Apr. 12, 2011	Pennsylvania	Desiree Morris	Flood Insurance Class Action 3 classes	Filed
Mar. 30, 2011	California	880 Los Angeles Borrowers	Predatory Mortgage Lending	WF must pay $3.5 Million
Mar. 7, 2011	California	Thomas M. Coleman	Motion to force arbitration Breach of fiduciary duties	Order affirmed - Respondent Coleman to recover costs
Feb. 22, 2011	Florida	Florida retiree	IRA malfeasance, excessive trading	Pending
Feb. 21, 2011	Georgia	Veteran's Class Action	Veterans were overcharged on mortgages	Wells Fargo must pay $10 Million
Feb. 2, 2011	California	Shellie Gordon vs Wells Fargo	Overtime Class Action Misclassified employees	Filed
Jan. 7, 2011	Mass.	Massachusetts Supreme Court	Illegal Foreclosures Improper/ incomplete paperwork	No more phony foreclosure assignments
2010
Dec. 20, 2010	California	California Attorney General	Predatory Loans Settlement Wachovia wrongdoing, primarily bringing about its collapse - Billions are owed to Californians	Wells Fargo has agreed in a settlement to offer home-loan modifications worth $2 billion, and will also pay $32 million in restitution to borrowers who lost their homes through foreclosures.
Oct. 27, 2010	Nevada	Alkimya Group	Fraud Breach of Contract Negligent Misrepresentation	Filed
Aug. 11, 2010	California	Gutierrez vs. Wells Fargo	Gouging and profiteering -  phony overdraft fees	Wells Fargo must pay $203 Million
Jul. 19, 2010	Mass.	Homeowner Group	Loan Modifications Denied Breech of Contract	Pending
Jun. 30, 2010	Florida	Sarasota County	Improper Investment Advice	Suit seeks $40 Million
Apr. 14, 2010	Tennessee	City of Memphis, TN	Predatory Lending	Pending
Jan. 12, 2010	D.C.	Wells Fargo vs. U.S.	Improper Tax Deductions - SILO Improper deals with tax-exempt entities	Wells denied $115M in tax deductions
Jan. 7, 2010	Maryland	City of Baltimore, MD	Predatory Lending - Ghetto Loans	Dismissed - recession blamed Judge caves in to Wells
2009
Nov. 20, 2009	California	California Attorney General	Auction Rate Securities Fraud	Wells Fargo agrees to buy back worthless securities
Oct. 23, 2011	New York	Wells Fargo vs. Marchione et al.	Wells Fargo Loses Appeal	Assignments disallowed
Jul. 31, 2009	Illinois	Illinois Attorney General	Discriminatory illegal lending Blacks steered to sub-prime loans	-
2008
Oct. 30, 2008	California	6,600 Home Loan Consultants Class Action	Unreimbursed Business Expenses Improper deductions	Wells Fargo agrees to pay up to $10 Million
Oct. 3, 2008	Washington	Hagens Berman	Excessive overdraft fees Transaction resequencing	-
		MERS	Mortgage Electronic Registration System
		TARP	Troubled Asset Relief Program
		TILA	Truth in Lending Act
100	70	210	280 - 940	280

Embargo Wells Fargo Boycott Wells Fargo - Shun Wells Fargo Don't Be Stupid - Move Your Money - Leave Wells Fargo NOW Fails of Wells Fargo Too Numerous to Count, but I will try. Fraud, Contrived Fees, Fee Gouging, Predatory Lending, Illegal Foreclosure, Denied Loan Modifications, etc.

top of page Please Add My Case to this page. Trademark Notice: "Wells Fargo" is a registered trademark of Wells Fargo and Company. This website is in no way affiliated with Wells Fargo and Company or their affiliates, and the "Wells Fargo" trademark is used solely for informational purposes. Disclaimer: The above data comes straight from Google Search, which lists lawsuits filed against Wells Fargo Bank in the US. All reported errors will be corrected after verification. This page contains 2 Wells Fargo parody images. The subject matter is dry - some levity is required. Tags: lawsuits against wells fargo, list Vaughn's Summaries ©2011 Vaughn Aubuchon ... All Rights Reserved www.vaughns-1-pagers.com This Vaughns Wells Fargo Lawsuits List web page was updated on 2011-05-23.

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HURTIN' FOR CERTAIN. PAYBACK IS HELL.

Wells Fargo Chief Stumpf Says Lender’s Primary Focus Controlling Expenses

By Laura Marcinek and Dakin Campbell - May 23, 2011 7:56 AM CT

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Chief Executive Officer John Stumpf. Photographer: Davis Turner/Bloomberg

Wells Fargo & Co. (WFC), the biggest U.S. home lender, is concentrating on controlling expenses including the cost of bad mortgages, Chief Executive Officer John Stumpf said.

The bank “continued to focus on corporate-wide expense reductions,” according to a presentation by Stumpf today at a London investor conference sponsored by Barclays Plc. Non- interest expenses dropped 5 percent in the first quarter from the final three months of 2010, the presentation said.

The first quarter didn’t yet reflect a new company-wide effort to identify reductions, and the San Francisco-based bank expects expenses tied to soured loans will drop if the economy doesn’t weaken, according to Stumpf’s prepared remarks.

Wells Fargo, as the second-largest U.S. mortgage servicer, faces scrutiny from federal regulators, state officials and consumer advocates over its handling of foreclosures. The lender was one of 14 of the largest servicers to sign consent decrees compelling them to overhaul procedures for seizing homes and pay back homeowners for losses on foreclosures that were mishandled.

State and federal officials have been negotiating with the mortgage servicers, which include Citigroup Inc., Bank of America Corp., JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Ally Financial Inc., which handle almost 60 percent of U.S. home loans.

The five banks proposed paying $5 billion to settle the probe by all 50 states that’s being led by Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller into the mortgage servicing industry, two people familiar with the matter said earlier this month. Stumpf declined today to predict the outcome.

Wachovia Merger

Wells Fargo is in the final year of integrating Wachovia Corp., and has reported more than $25 billion in profit after buying the Charlotte, North Carolina-based bank in 2008. Stumpf said today he doesn’t regret doing the deal, which will “pay dividends for years and years to come.”

While there are signs of increasing demand for loans from business customers, retail customers are still “cleaning up their portfolios,” Stumpf said.

On the regulatory front, Stumpf said reform of the federally backed companies that guarantee home mortgages isn’t likely before 2013. Resolving the status of Fannie Mae and Freddie Macmay be delayed in part by the 2012 election cycle, he said.

Wells Fargo closed at $28 last week on the New York Stock Exchange. The shares are down 9.7 percent this year, making the stock one of the worst performers in the 24-company KBW Bank Index, which dropped 4.8 percent this year.

To contact the reporters on this story: Laura Marcinek in New York atlmarcinek3@bloomberg.net; Dakin Campbell in San Francisco at dcampbell27@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editor responsible for this story: David Scheer at dscheer@bloomberg.net.

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