Wells Fargo Racial Disparity Case Heads to Class Action Decision
- Lawyers say 119,100 people denied mortgages could seek relief
- Bank disputes claims credit-scoring algorithm hurt minorities
A Wells Fargo bank branch.
Photographer: Angus Mordant/Bloomberg
Wells Fargo & Co. faces a decision as soon as this month on whether a lawsuit over its pandemic-era mortgage denials to non-White applicants gets class-action status, a key turning point in a high-profile and potentially costly case.
The bank, which was long the biggest US mortgage lender until a recent pullback under Chief Executive Officer Charlie Scharf, has asked a federal judge in California to deny the motion the plaintiffs filed earlier this year. The case consolidates a number of lawsuits brought before and after Bloomberg News reported in 2022 that Wells Fargo rejected a majority of Black homeowners who applied to refinance mortgages in 2020, the only big bank to deny more Black applicants than it accepted.