Four mortgage banks in the United States revealed the impact of mounting losses from the American credit crisis and housing recession yesterday, as Wells Fargo admitted to a $490 million (£241 million) charge to cover bad home loans.
Wells Fargo is the fifth-biggest American mortgage lender and boasts Warren Buffett as its largest shareholder. His Berkshire Hathaway investment group owns 7.7 per cent of the stock as of June 30, according to Thomson ShareWatch. Wells Fargo has more than 3,200 branches in 23 US states and $548.7 billion of assets.
The bank said yesterday that it had written off $490 million of bad mortgages in the third quarter of the year as America slides into its worst housing recession for 16 years.
Howard Atkins, the