Despite Fiduciary Uncertainty, Wells Fargo Details Compliance Plans

Wells Fargo & Co. will continue to allow retirement savers who work with its brokerage arm to pay a commission for trades to comply with new conflict-of-interest rules on retirement accounts, according to a memorandum viewed by The Wall Street Journal.

The bank detailed its plans for compliance with the Labor Department's so-called fiduciary rule despite speculation it will be dismantled by Republicans and Donald Trump next year. The rule, which is set to take effect in April, requires brokers to act in the best interests of their clients when it comes to retirement accounts.

"While there is a great deal of speculation in the media on how the election results will affect the DOL rule, none of us can say with certainty what will actually happen," Wells Fargo said in the memo to its more than 15,000 brokers Thursday, adding that while it is planning for a variety of different scenarios, it is preparing for the rule's April implementation.

Wells Fargo's brokerage arm, Wells Fargo Advisors, which has more $1.5 trillion in total client assets, said it would allow its brokers to continue offering individual retirement accounts that charge investors per-transaction commissions, an approach toward compliance with the rule also taken by brokerages such as Morgan Stanley and Edward Jones.

However, clients in those accounts after April will have a slimmer menu of investment products to choose from, people with knowledge of the matter said, although details of those offerings weren't clear at this time. Edward Jones, for example, won't allow retirement savers to pay a commission for mutual funds next year.

The approach differs from those taken by Bank of America Corp.'s Merrill Lynch and J.P. Morgan Chase & Co., among others. Merrill and J.P. Morgan said in recent months that they would ditch the industry's traditional commission-based sales model for retirement accounts and effectively will offer only IRAs that charge a fee based on a percentage of assets starting next year.

Write to Michael Wursthorn at Michael.Wursthorn@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

December 01, 2016 14:25 ET (19:25 GMT)

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