Wells Fargo Lawyers Were Too Cost Focused, Report Says

After taking six months to investigate how Wells Fargo became enveloped in an abusive sales scandal, Shearman & Sterling has produced a 113-page report that lays into the legal department for missing the big picture and focusing too much on cost-containment.

Released on Monday,thereport (PDF) was commissioned by the board of directors, which in September retained Shearman to assist an oversight committee in examining the scandal, in which bank employees created an untold number of fraudulent bank accounts in customers’ names in order to meet their sales targets.

As part of the fallout, it fired 5,300 employees, agreed to ...