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Good move. There have to be repercussions for what Wells Fargo did, and I’m not talking fines which are meaningless in a case like this. This at least is a start. I don’t think anyone will actually begin to take notice until people are put in jail. But then again there is no rule of law in this country so why should we expect that to happen?

Via Bloomberg.

California, the nation’s largest issuer of municipal bonds, is barring Wells Fargo & Co. from underwriting state debt, from its banking transactions and in its investments after the company admitted to opening millions of bogus customer accounts.

The suspension, in effect immediately, will remain in place for 12 months, State Treasurer John Chiang said Wednesday. “Complete and permanent severance” between his office and the bank will occur if it doesn’t change its practices, he said.

“Wells Fargo’s fleecing of its customers by opening fraudulent accounts for the purpose of extracting millions in illegal fees demonstrates, at best, a reckless lack of institutional control and, at worst, a culture which actively promotes wanton greed,” the treasurer said in a statement.

The move by California is the latest to punish the bank, which is facing a national furor over the fraudulent accounts. San Francisco, the home of Wells Fargo, last week removed it from a banking program for low-income residents. Authorities including the U.S. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau fined Wells Fargo $185 million on Sept. 8 for potentially opening about 2 million deposit and credit-card accounts without authorization. Chief Executive Officer John Stumpf has forfeited $41 million in pay.

$41 million in pay is also nothing to these people. Elizabeth Warren is also not impressed.She’s bee doing a great job on this issue.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren doesn’t think Wells Fargo went far enough by taking away $41 million in stock-based compensation from CEO John Stumpf.

In a tweetstorm on Wednesday, the Democratic senator from Massachusetts said the clawback authorized by the Wells board of directors was a “small step in the right direction,” but not a complete solution.

“Wells Fargo CEO Stumpf will be just fine: he keeps his job & most of the money he made while massive fraud went on under his nose,” Warren wrote in a tweet.

She also reiterated her claim made last week during Stumpf’s testimony to the Senate banking committee that he should return all the money he has made since 2011, when the bank’s employees began opening accounts without customers’ knowledge. She repeated her belief that Stumpf should resign and be criminally investigated by the Department of Justice and the Securities and Exchange Commission.

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