- Report: #326114
Complaint Review: Wells Fargo - San Francisco California
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Wells Fargo
420 Montgomery San Francisco, 94104 California, U.S.A.
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Wells Fargo Conflict of Interest and Violation of Code of Ethics by Chairman d**k Kovacevich? San Francisco California
The following email was sent to [email protected] in the second quarter of 2007. Wells Fargo did not deem this issue worthy of a reply. What do you think? This matter may be worth investigating in further detail. Care to help?
I assume Wells Fargo pre-approved Mr. Kovacevich's nomination and election to the Cisco board of directors in January 2005, as required by the Wells Fargo Code of Ethics. However, this same code stipulates all team members , "must avoid conflicts of interests or the appearance of conflicts in your personal and business activities. In many cases, the appearance of a conflict may be just as damaging to Wells Fargo and its reputation as an actual conflict of interest."
Based on publicly available information, there appear to be several conflicts of interest between Mr. Kovacevich's personal business pursuits and the corporate financial objectives and reputation of the Wells Fargo Enterprise. To wit:
1.) Mr. Richard Kovacevich was elected a director at Cisco in January 2005 and he now currently holds 30,629 common stock shares valued at $798,804.31. SEC Form 4 dated 11-17-06 also indicates Mr. Kovacevich has an option to buy 15,000 Cisco common stock shares at $26.60. Unfortunately, the public at large does not know whether these shares and options have trade restrictions or whether Mr. Kovacevich is prohibited from buying or selling Cisco stock during his tenure as a Cisco director. This appearance of a conflict of interest may have already directly or indirectly damaged the Wells Fargo Enterprise and its shareholders.
2.) As a recent prospectus indicates, Cisco and Wells Fargo & Company share financial interests: Wells Fargo Securities LLC acts as an underwriter and co-manager for notes issued by Cisco (these notes are valued at $142,498,000) and Cisco may pay fees to Wells Fargo for commercial banking services. A recent Cisco prospectus quite correctly acknowledges Mr. Kovacevich is both a Cisco director and the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Wells Fargo & Company. However, I have been unable to uncover any Wells Fargo communications or publications that identify and properly address the financial conflict of interest that appears to exist between the Enterprise, one of its business partners or customers (Cisco), and a Wells Fargo team member and company officer who has been personally and amply compensated for his services as a Cisco director.
3.) A document (StrategicPartnerUpdateCISCO_PEAP.doc) published on the Wells Fargo intranet stresses Cisco's relevance as a "strategic partner" and "leading vendor" of the Enterprise. Once again, I have been unable to uncover any documents that properly disclose this potential conflict of interest caused by an Enterprise officer who can influence or approve purchasing decisions and who at the same time, has personally profited from a relationship with one of the Enterprises' leading vendors.
As a Wells Fargo shareholder and Team Member, I look forward to a detailed response to these concerns.
wellsfargoinjustice.com
San Francisco, California
U.S.A.
I assume Wells Fargo pre-approved Mr. Kovacevich's nomination and election to the Cisco board of directors in January 2005, as required by the Wells Fargo Code of Ethics. However, this same code stipulates all team members , "must avoid conflicts of interests or the appearance of conflicts in your personal and business activities. In many cases, the appearance of a conflict may be just as damaging to Wells Fargo and its reputation as an actual conflict of interest."
Based on publicly available information, there appear to be several conflicts of interest between Mr. Kovacevich's personal business pursuits and the corporate financial objectives and reputation of the Wells Fargo Enterprise. To wit:
1.) Mr. Richard Kovacevich was elected a director at Cisco in January 2005 and he now currently holds 30,629 common stock shares valued at $798,804.31. SEC Form 4 dated 11-17-06 also indicates Mr. Kovacevich has an option to buy 15,000 Cisco common stock shares at $26.60. Unfortunately, the public at large does not know whether these shares and options have trade restrictions or whether Mr. Kovacevich is prohibited from buying or selling Cisco stock during his tenure as a Cisco director. This appearance of a conflict of interest may have already directly or indirectly damaged the Wells Fargo Enterprise and its shareholders.
2.) As a recent prospectus indicates, Cisco and Wells Fargo & Company share financial interests: Wells Fargo Securities LLC acts as an underwriter and co-manager for notes issued by Cisco (these notes are valued at $142,498,000) and Cisco may pay fees to Wells Fargo for commercial banking services. A recent Cisco prospectus quite correctly acknowledges Mr. Kovacevich is both a Cisco director and the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Wells Fargo & Company. However, I have been unable to uncover any Wells Fargo communications or publications that identify and properly address the financial conflict of interest that appears to exist between the Enterprise, one of its business partners or customers (Cisco), and a Wells Fargo team member and company officer who has been personally and amply compensated for his services as a Cisco director.
3.) A document (StrategicPartnerUpdateCISCO_PEAP.doc) published on the Wells Fargo intranet stresses Cisco's relevance as a "strategic partner" and "leading vendor" of the Enterprise. Once again, I have been unable to uncover any documents that properly disclose this potential conflict of interest caused by an Enterprise officer who can influence or approve purchasing decisions and who at the same time, has personally profited from a relationship with one of the Enterprises' leading vendors.
As a Wells Fargo shareholder and Team Member, I look forward to a detailed response to these concerns.
wellsfargoinjustice.com
San Francisco, California
U.S.A.
2 Updates & Rebuttals
wellsfargoinjustice.com
Minneapolis,Minnesota,
U.S.A.
Make Your Voices Heard - Contact Wells Fargo Officers and Departments Directly via Email or Phone
#2Author of original report
Sat, April 26, 2008
Some people find it difficult to believe any of Wells Fargos' 150,000 employees or millions of customers would ever be unhappy or dissatisfied with the firms' level of customer service, operations, financial performance, ethics, data privacy and information security safeguards, etc. Of course, a brief look at www.ripoffreport.com or a quick search on any Internet search engine offers ample evidence that Wells Fargo is discriminatory, unethical, and engages in questionable if not illegal business practices. In any case, if you want to contact Wells Fargo regarding any of your concerns or complaints, you may want to check out the contact information (including individual phone numbers and email addresses) for numerous Wells Fargo departments and employees at http://www.wellsfargoinjustice.com-a.googlepages.com/email. Please let us know what sort of response (if any) you receive from Chairman d**k Kovacevich or others at Wells Fargo. And if you know how to contact specific Wells Fargo employees who are not currently listed on our site, please send us this information. We will be happy to include it on our website.
wellsfargoinjustice.com
Minneapolis,Minnesota,
U.S.A.
Is Wells Fargo Directly Making Political Donations Separately from its PAC?
#3Author of original report
Thu, April 17, 2008
I should mention a communication regarding this issue was sent to the email addresses for Mr. Kovacevich ( [email protected]), the Board of Directors ([email protected]) and several others. However, no one ever replied to these messages. How can anyone successfully communicate with Wells Fargo's top management to address and resolve consumer complaints, problems or concerns? It is difficult if not impossible for Wells Fargo keeps a tight lid on the contact information for its individual employees, especially its high-level officers including John Stumpf and d**k Kovacevich. Of course, I understand top managers have no time to review each and every specific problem its customers might encounter. But if no one with real power and authority ever reviews the myriad of systemic problems that exists in every organization, how will these problems ever really be solved? Like politicians, Mr. Kovaceich, et. al. sit in their ivory towers, oblivious to what really goes on in their organizations. Granted, a person can theoretically send a registered letter to top management via snail mail, but that does not guarantee a response will be received. I've uncovered (and posted online) the email addresses for Mr. Kovacevich, Corporate Affairs, Investor Relations, the Board of Directors, etc. and I have personally emailed numerous communications to each address. However, I have never received a response or acknowledgment from any one at Wells Fargo. The issues I raised are significant, including inadequate information security and data privacy safeguards throughout the company as well as improper, questionable and possibly illegal accounting and financial reporting on a major scale. As an ex-employee at Wells Fargo, I know the company is not the honest, responsible, benevolent and community-minded organization it pretends to be! I encourage you to review my website for details on some of the issues I have raised. I also encourage current or ex-employees to submit (anonymously if preferred) any damning evidence or useful information they may have regarding Wells Fargo to ripoffreports.com or my own website (which I can not reference here because of the policies of this site).
