SAN FRANCISCO–As it continues to suffer a decline in retail business following revelations of bogus account openings, Wells Fargo has announced it will close 400 of its branches by the end of 2018.
The bank did not identify the branches that have been targeted for closing.
As CUToday.info reported here, Wells Fargo reported that new credit card applications were down 43% in the fourth quarter of 2016 from one year earlier, and that new checking account openings fell 40% over the same period. In addition, during Q4 2016 Wells Fargo said teller transactions declined 6% from a year ago, while customer interactions with the bankers in the branches declined 14%.
Overall, Wells Fargo reported a larger loss than had been expected for Q4, with its profits falling 4.3% to $21.9 billion.