The North American Securities Administrators Association Wednesday announced a settlement in principle between Wells Fargo Investments LLC and state securities regulators to return approximately $1.3 billion to the firm's clients whose funds have been frozen in the auction rate securities market.

This resolution follows more than a dozen other auction rate securities settlements involving companies such as Merrill Lynch, UBS AG (UBS), TD Ameritrade, Inc. (AMTD), Bank of America Corp. (BAC), Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (GS), Deutsche Bank AG (DB), JP Morgan Chase & Co. (JPM), Citigroup Inc. (C) and Credit Suisse Group AG (CS).

These settlements have called for these firms to repurchase more than $61 billion in auction rate securities from investors, the largest return of funds to investors in history, NASAA said.

"We will continue to seek much needed relief for investors who have suffered from the collapse of the ARS markets," said NASAA President and Texas Securities Commissioner Denise Voigt Crawford in a statement.

The settlement with a brokerage unit of Wells Fargo (WFC) is the result of an investigation led by the Securities Division of the Washington State Department of Financial Institutions into allegations that Wells Fargo misled clients by falsely assuring them that auction rate securities were a safe, liquid alternative to cash, certificates of deposit or money market funds.

The auction rate securities markets froze in February 2008, triggering complaints from investors who could not withdraw money from their accounts. At the time of the market failures, customers of Wells Fargo Investments nationwide held an estimated $2.95 billion in these securities.

Under the terms of the settlement, Wells Fargo agreed to buy back at face value before April of next year all auction rate securities purchased through its brokerage unit by investors before Feb. 13, 2008. The bank agreed to fully reimburse certain investors who sold these securities at a discount after the market failed; consent to public arbitration to resolve other investor claims as a result of their inability to access their funds, and pay $1.9 million in penalties to the states.

-By Shelly Banjo; Dow Jones Newswires; 212-416-2242; shelly.banjo@dowjones.com
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