Wells Fargo CEO resigns from San Francisco Fed's advisory council

Wells Fargo & Co Chief Executive John Stumpf, under fire over problematic sales tactics, resigned��from the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco's advisory council on Thursday.

"John made a personal decision to resign as the Twelfth District's representative to the Federal Advisory Council. His top priority is leading Wells Fargo," Wells Fargo spokesman Mark Folk said in an email.

A spokesman for the San Francisco Fed declined to comment beyond a press release from the regulator announcing Stumpf's resignation.

The Federal Advisory Council has 12 banking industry representatives and ordinarily meets four times a year. Representatives typically serve three one-year terms. Stumpf's second term would have ended at the end of this year.

Maine Senator Angus King, a political independent, wrote a letter on Thursday to San Francisco Fed Chairman Roy Vallee asking him not to appoint Stumpf for a third one-year term. Four Senate Democrats also signed the letter.

Wells Fargo has fired some 5,300 employees for opening as many as 2 million accounts in customers' names without their authorization. On Sept. 8, a federal regulator and Los Angeles prosecutor announced a $190 million settlement with Wells.

(Additional reporting by Diptendu Lahiri in Bengaluru and Patrick Rucker in Washington, D.C.; Editing by Sriraj Kalluvila and Chris Reese)