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Commitments, Contingencies, Guarantees, and Others | 12 Months Ended
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Dec. 31, 2021
Commitments and Contingencies Disclosure [Abstract] |
Commitments, Contingencies, Guarantees and Others |
NOTE 18—COMMITMENTS, CONTINGENCIES, GUARANTEES AND OTHERS
Commitments to Lend Our unfunded lending commitments primarily consist of credit card lines, loan commitments to customers of both our Commercial Banking and Consumer Banking businesses, as well as standby and commercial letters of credit. These commitments, other than credit card lines, are legally binding conditional agreements that have fixed expirations or termination dates and specified interest rates and purposes. The contractual amount of these commitments represents the maximum possible credit risk to us should the counterparty draw upon the commitment. We generally manage the potential risk of unfunded lending commitments by limiting the total amount of arrangements, monitoring the size and maturity structure of these portfolios and applying the same credit standards for all of our credit activities. For unused credit card lines, we have not experienced and do not anticipate that all of our customers will access their entire available line at any given point in time. Commitments to extend credit other than credit card lines generally require customers to maintain certain credit standards. Collateral requirements and loan-to-value (“LTV”) ratios are the same as those for funded transactions and are established based on management’s credit assessment of the customer. These commitments may expire without being drawn upon; therefore, the total commitment amount does not necessarily represent future funding requirements. We also issue letters of credit, such as financial standby, performance standby and commercial letters of credit, to meet the financing needs of our customers. Standby letters of credit are conditional commitments issued by us to guarantee the performance of a customer to a third party in a borrowing arrangement. Commercial letters of credit are short-term commitments issued primarily to facilitate trade finance activities for customers and are generally collateralized by the goods being shipped to the customer. These collateral requirements are similar to those for funded transactions and are established based on management’s credit assessment of the customer. Management conducts regular reviews of all outstanding letters of credit and the results of these reviews are considered in assessing the adequacy of reserves for unfunded lending commitments. The following table presents the contractual amount and carrying value of our unfunded lending commitments as of December 31, 2021 and 2020. The carrying value represents our reserve and deferred revenue on legally binding commitments. Table 18.1: Unfunded Lending Commitments
|  | Contractual Amount |  | Carrying Value
(Dollars in millions) |  | December 31, 2021 |  | December 31, 2020 |  | December 31, 2021 |  | December 31, 2020
Credit card lines |  | $ | 368,508 |  |  | $ | 349,594 |  |  | N/A |  | N/A
Other loan commitments(1) |  | 44,572 |  |  | 35,836 |  |  | $ | 125 |  |  | $ | 144 |
Standby letters of credit and commercial letters of credit(2) |  | 1,419 |  |  | 1,302 |  |  | 24 |  |  | 32 |
Total unfunded lending commitments |  | $ | 414,499 |  |  | $ | 386,732 |  |  | $ | 149 |  |  | $ | 176 |
__________ (1)Includes $3.9 billion and $1.8 billion of advised lines of credit as of December 31, 2021 and 2020, respectively. (2)These financial guarantees have expiration dates that range from 2021 to 2023 as of December 31, 2021. Loss Sharing Agreements Within our Commercial Banking business, we originate multifamily commercial real estate loans with the intent to sell them to the GSEs. We enter into loss sharing agreements with the GSEs upon the sale of the loans. Beginning January 1, 2020, we elected the fair value option on new loss sharing agreements. Unrealized gains and losses are recorded in other non-interest income in our consolidated statements of income. For those loss sharing agreements entered into as of and prior to December 31, 2019, we amortize the liability recorded at inception into non-interest income as we are released from risk of payment under the loss sharing agreement and record our estimate of expected credit losses each period in provision for credit losses in our consolidated statements of income. The liability recognized on our consolidated balance sheets for these loss sharing agreements was $90 million and $97 million as of December 31, 2021 and 2020, respectively. See “Note 4—Allowance for Credit Losses and Reserve for Unfunded Lending Commitments” for more information related to our credit card partnership loss sharing arrangements. Litigation In accordance with the current accounting standards for loss contingencies, we establish reserves for litigation-related matters that arise from the ordinary course of our business activities when it is probable that a loss associated with a claim or proceeding has been incurred and the amount of the loss can be reasonably estimated. None of the amounts we currently have recorded individually or in the aggregate are considered to be material to our financial condition. Litigation claims and proceedings of all types are subject to many uncertain factors that generally cannot be predicted with assurance. Below we provide a description of potentially material legal proceedings and claims. For some of the matters disclosed below, we are able to estimate reasonably possible losses above existing reserves, and for other disclosed matters, such an estimate is not possible at this time. For those matters below where an estimate is possible, management currently estimates the reasonably possible future losses beyond our reserves as of December 31, 2021 are approximately $200 million. Our reserve and reasonably possible loss estimates involve considerable judgment and reflect that there is still significant uncertainty regarding numerous factors that may impact the ultimate loss levels. Notwithstanding, our attempt to estimate a reasonably possible range of loss beyond our current accrual levels for some litigation matters based on current information, it is possible that actual future losses will exceed both the current accrual level and the range of reasonably possible losses disclosed here. Given the inherent uncertainties involved in these matters, especially those involving governmental agencies, and the very large or indeterminate damages sought in some of these matters, there is significant uncertainty as to the ultimate liability we may incur from these litigation matters and an adverse outcome in one or more of these matters could be material to our results of operations or cash flows for any particular reporting period. Interchange In 2005, a putative class of retail merchants filed antitrust lawsuits against MasterCard and Visa and several issuing banks, including Capital One, seeking both injunctive relief and monetary damages for an alleged conspiracy by defendants to fix the level of interchange fees. Other merchants have asserted similar claims in separate lawsuits, and while these separate cases did not name any issuing banks, Visa, MasterCard and issuers, including Capital One, have entered settlement and judgment sharing agreements allocating the liabilities of any judgment or settlement arising from all interchange-related cases. The lawsuits were consolidated before the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York for certain purposes and were settled in 2012. The class settlement, however, was invalidated by the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in June 2016, and the suit was bifurcated into separate class actions seeking injunctive and monetary relief, respectively. In addition, numerous merchant groups opted out of the 2012 settlement and have pursued their own claims. The claims by the injunctive relief class have not been resolved, but the settlement of $5.5 billion for the monetary damages class received final approval from the trial court, and has been appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. Visa and MasterCard have also settled a number of the opt-out cases, which required non-material payments from issuing banks, including Capital One. Visa created a litigation escrow account following its initial public offering of stock in 2008 that funds settlements for its member banks, and any settlements related to MasterCard-allocated losses have either already been paid or are reflected in our reserves. Cybersecurity Incident On July 29, 2019, we announced that on March 22 and 23, 2019 an outside individual gained unauthorized access to our systems. This individual obtained certain types of personal information relating to people who had applied for our credit card products and to our credit card customers (the “Cybersecurity Incident”). As a result of the Cybersecurity Incident, we are subject to numerous legal proceedings and other inquiries and could be the subject of additional proceedings and inquiries in the future. Consumer class actions. We were named as a defendant in approximately 75 putative consumer class action cases (primarily in U.S. courts with cases also in Canadian courts) alleging harm from the Cybersecurity Incident and seeking various remedies, including monetary and injunctive relief. The lawsuits allege breach of contract, negligence, violations of various privacy laws and a variety of other legal causes of action. The U.S. consumer class actions have been consolidated for pretrial proceedings before a multi-district litigation (“MDL”) panel in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division. In the third quarter of 2020, the MDL court denied in part and granted in part Capital One’s motion to dismiss and permitted pretrial discovery to continue. In the fourth quarter of 2021, the parties agreed to a settlement of the U.S. consumer class action cases for $190 million, which was covered by the Company's legal reserve for this matter. The parties are in the process of seeking the required court approval of the class settlement. Securities class action. The Company and certain officers have also been named as defendants in a putative class action pending in the MDL alleging violations of certain federal securities laws in connection with statements and alleged omissions in securities filings relating to our information security standards and practices. The complaint seeks certification of a class of all persons who purchased or otherwise acquired Capital One securities from July 23, 2015 to July 29, 2019, as well as unspecified monetary damages, costs and other relief. The Company’s motion to dismiss the case is pending. Governmental inquiries. We have received inquiries and requests for information relating to the Cybersecurity Incident from Congress, federal regulators, relevant Canadian regulators, the Department of Justice, and the offices of approximately fourteen state Attorneys General. We have cooperated with these offices and responded to their inquiries. In August 2020, we entered into consent orders with the Federal Reserve and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (“OCC”) resulting from regulatory reviews of the Cybersecurity Incident and relating to ongoing enhancements of our cybersecurity and operational risk management processes. We paid an $80 million penalty to the U.S. Treasury as part of the OCC agreement. The Federal Reserve agreement did not contain a monetary penalty. Taxi Medallion Finance Investigations Beginning in 2019, we have received subpoenas from the New York Attorney General’s office and from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York, Civil and Criminal Divisions, relating to investigations of the taxi medallion finance industry we exited beginning in 2015. The subpoenas seek, among other things, information regarding our lending counterparties and practices. We are cooperating with these investigations. U.K. PPI Litigation In the U.K., we previously sold payment protection insurance (“PPI”). For several years leading up to the claims submission deadline of August 29, 2019 (as set by the U.K. Financial Conduct Authority), we received customer complaints and regulatory claims relating to PPI. COEP has materially resolved the PPI complaints and regulatory claims received prior to the deadline. Some of the claimants in the U.K. PPI regulatory claims process have subsequently initiated legal proceedings, seeking additional redress. We are responding to these proceedings as we receive them. Other Pending and Threatened Litigation In addition, we are commonly subject to various pending and threatened legal actions relating to the conduct of our normal business activities. In the opinion of management, the ultimate aggregate liability, if any, arising out of all such other pending or threatened legal actions is not expected to be material to our consolidated financial position or our results of operations.

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