By Lananh Nguyen, Saeed Azhar

Wells Fargo's Progress on Compliance Issues

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Wells Fargo CEO Charlie Scharf expressed greater confidence on Wednesday regarding the bank's progress in addressing compliance issues stemming from its years-long fake accounts scandal, outlining efforts to enhance risk controls.

> "For every one of our consent orders that we have, for every one of our regulatory deliverables, we have extremely detailed plans in place that the regulators have reviewed," he said during the Goldman Sachs Financial Services Conference.

Scharf mentioned that progress is monitored weekly by the operating committee.

The bank is nearing the completion of its regulatory tests to remove a $1.95 trillion asset cap next year, which was imposed in 2018 due to governance and risk-management failures after consumer abuses, as previously reported by Reuters.

This cap limits Wells Fargo's capacity to accept more deposits and hinder its trading business expansion, areas Scharf noted earlier as potential growth opportunities.

> "We've actually taken balance sheet over the years away from our trading businesses, predominantly in terms of what they're able to finance," he explained at the conference. "We've started to give some of that back to them, and so we'll continue to build that part of the business, which will benefit them."

Scharf also discussed improvements in operational risk management and compliance. He expressed optimism about the U.S. economy, indicating that both consumers and businesses are showing continued strength.

He praised the incoming administration of President-elect Donald Trump for its focus on supporting a diverse group of American individuals and companies.

> "They're very, very focused on ensuring that a broad group of Americans, both individuals and companies are successful," he said.