Under another scenario, the OCC could push for payouts to a Wells Fargo employee without waiting for the FDIC to concur. The FDIC has the final say on severance and until now the decisions have always been made jointly.
The FDIC has resisted hurrying its severance reviews, according to those familiar with the discussions.
But the current FDIC chief, Martin Gruenberg, could be replaced within weeks by a President Trump nominee.
If that happens and Noreika prevails, it could provide relief for Wells Fargo as it faces fresh scrutiny for wrongly charging customers for car insurance and mortgages.
Noreika is expected to leave the OCC in coming weeks, but the matter could be settled by Joseph Otting, the former banker who is Trump's permanent pick for the OCC. Otting is expected to favor a similar, light touch approach to financial rules.
Payouts
The "golden parachute" rule is meant to halt payouts to employees who played a role in a bank's problems, but Noreika has said too many innocent Wells Fargo employees are caught up in the reviews.
In a June 5 letter to a former Wells Fargo employee made public by the OCC, Noreika said that he had personally called Gruenberg to expedite a payment.
In the weeks after that letter was sent, sources said, the OCC has proposed speeding up the reviews, but the FDIC pushed back against setting "artificial" deadlines, according to one official.
"The OCC has sought ways to make regulatory reviews more efficient (and) complete in weeks not months," OCC spokesman Bryan Hubbard said, while declining to discuss inter-agency deliberations.