2016-19 sales scandal beat the company down hard. I suspect WF lost tons of clients, opportunities, COI referrals, etc, but nobody noticed. My read is that clients didn’t close accounts, they just took new business elsewhere. New accounts don’t move the needle for a few years until their business matures. And lost COI referrals are not possible to quantify. Nobody noticed, especially management.
Today WF is growing slower than the competition in almost every metric. Sure, WF might be growing in select areas, but not as fast as the economy or other companies. Sales scandal is still impacting business, as it will for many more years.
Then COVID rocked the company again, ripping open fresh wounds from 3 years of scandals with no time to heal.
IMO it will be another decade until the company can heal, if it lasts that long. It is sinking in front of our eyes because management won’t take the necessary steps to fix it.
To survive, the company needs to amputate the infected parts. I say sell WFA, sell Trust. Sell every part of the biggest eyesore of the business, Wealth Management. Get back to banking and lending and serving business and retail clients. Be the best at that. And that is it. That is how you save the company.