Banking Sector Rattled By Another “Emergency Rescue”

By Michael P. Norton

MARCH 19, 2023…..BOSTON – The banking sector was roiled Sunday by another “emergency rescue”. Sen. Elizabeth Warren over the weekend asked federal officials to open an investigation into bank management and regulatory problems that she said resulted in this month’s failures of Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank, and Lt. Gov. Kim Driscoll said recent upheaval in the industry has commanded the attention of the Healey administration.

Switzerland-based UBS announced plans to acquire Credit Suisse following discussions initiated by the Swiss Federal Department of Finance, the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority FINMA, and the Swiss National Bank.

“This acquisition is attractive for UBS shareholders but, let us be clear, as far as Credit Suisse is concerned, this is an emergency rescue,” UBS Chairman Colm Kelleher said on Sunday. “We have structured a transaction which will preserve the value left in the business while limiting our downside exposure.”

FINMA has been monitoring Credit Suisse “intensively” for months and said stabilization measures taken by the bank were not enough to restore confidence. “To protect depositors and the financial markets, the offer by UBS to take over Credit Suisse has proven to be the most effective solution,” FINMA said.

“The Credit Suisse Group is experiencing a crisis of confidence, which has manifested in considerable outflows of client funds,” FINMA said. “This was intensified by the upheavals in the US banking market in March 2023. There was a risk of the bank becoming illiquid, even if it remained solvent, and it was necessary for the authorities to take action in order to prevent serious damage to the Swiss and international financial markets.”

At 4 p.m. Sunday, U.S. Treasury Janet Yellen and Federal Reserve Board Chair Jerome Powell released a joint statement.

“We welcome the announcements by the Swiss authorities today to support financial stability,” Yellen and Powell said. “The capital and liquidity positions of the U.S. banking system are strong, and the U.S. financial system is resilient. We have been in close contact with our international counterparts to support their implementation.”

Separately, Warren on Sunday released a copy of her Saturday letter to the inspectors general of the U.S. Treasury, FDIC, and Federal Reserve Bank calling for an independent investigation of the SVB and Signature Bank failures. The senator said she would like preliminary results of those probes within 30 days.

“These failures were extraordinary events: they were the second- and third-largest bank failures in the nation’s history, which — until the Treasury Department, in consultation with the Federal Reserve and Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), determined them to be ‘systemic risks’ and intervened to guarantee billions of dollars of deposits — threatened economic contagion and severe damage to the banking and financial systems,” she wrote.

Working to protect Massachusetts businesses who are dependent on the two banks, Gov. Maura Healey’s administration was activited last weekend as the SVB and Signature failures unfolded. Asked if she was confident that the “banking crisis” is under control, Lt. Gov. Kim Driscoll pivoted to regional banks.

“The FDIC came in Sunday night, really protected all our depositors. But it has set us up to say, ‘Hey, where are we going?’ ” Driscoll said during a pre-recorded WCVB “On The Record” show that aired Sunday. “And our regional banks are strong. We feel fortunate about the regional banks we have. We’re going to work in partnership to make sure we still have an innovation economy that can thrive, notwithstanding some of the concerns that we’re currently seeing.”