In the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis, the banking industry sought to address an ethics crisis with surveys, town hall meetings, appointments of overseers and mechanisms for employees to report malfeasance.

Now, the high-pressure sales scandal at Wells Fargo & Co provides more evidence that large U.S. banks may have little to show for the effort.

Bank consultants say tens of millions of dollars are spent each year on initiatives to build a culture of integrity, partly at the urging of regulators such as the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and the U.S. Office of the Comptroller of the Currency.