Banks

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Deal to buy Silicon Valley Bank calms bank fears, for now

NEW YORK (AP) — First Citizens Bank is buying much of Silicon Valley Bank, the tech-focused financial institution whose failure this month set off a chain reaction that helped rattle faith in banks around the world.

https://apnews.com/article/svb-banks-fdic-first-citizen-silicon-f6958f1fa87b0991cb525b0424c7a1cd

Fed official: SVB itself was main cause of bank’s failure

WASHINGTON (AP) — The nation’s top financial regulator is asserting that Silicon Valley Bank’s own management was largely to blame for the bank’s failure earlier this month and says the Federal Reserve will review whether a 2018 law that weakened stricter bank rules also contributed to its collapse.

https://apnews.com/article/bank-failure-federal-reserve-silicon-valley-deposits-84f3377f525fed29aa80d9fe9e674df9

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Bank failures and rescue test Yellen’s decades of experience

WASHINGTON (AP) — Working against the clock to stop a developing banking crisis, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen had until sunset on Sunday, March 12, to come up with a plan to calm the U.S. economy.

https://apnews.com/article/yellen-inflation-banking-siliconvalleybank-interest-rates-02a8a3c68cffe7b693f2ed34cca72e17?

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First Republic Bank Paid Founder’s Family Millions for Consulting Work: WSJ

First Republic Bank’s founder James Herbert, along with his son and brother-in-law, have secured multi-million dollar paydays in recent years, an investigation from The Wall Street Journal revealed Friday. The investigation comes after the bank’s recent catastrophic stock crash, with shares dropping 70 percent last week. Herbert made $17.8 million in 2021, far more than CEOs at similarly-sized banks, according to the Journal. Meanwhile, his son made $3.5 million to oversee a lending unit, and his brother-in-law's consulting company made $2.3 million for advisory work, the Journal reported. Just last week, news also broke that executives at First Republic Bank sold millions of dollars of company stock in the months leading up to the recent crash.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/first-republic-bank-paid-founder-james-herbert-and-family-millions-in-recent-years-investigation-reveals?

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Members of U.S. Senate panel press financial regulators on massive bank failures

WASHINGTON — Financial regulators promised a full review of Silicon Valley Bank’s massive failure as members of a key U.S. Senate panel on Tuesday interrogated the officials about what led to the second-largest bank collapse in U.S. history.

https://floridaphoenix.com/2023/03/28/members-of-u-s-senate-panel-press-financial-regulators-on-massive-bank-failures/?

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First Republic Bank’s Stock Tanks After Losing $102 Billion in Customer Deposits

First Republic Bank shares plummeted 27 percent in early trading Tuesday morning after it disclosed Monday that it lost a staggering $102 billion in customer deposits. Confidence in the bank began to evaporate after customers pulled billions in deposits from Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank last month, causing First Republic to suffer a similar fate. It was unclear until Monday just how much First Republic had lost from bleeding deposits, and the bombshell was delivered in a conference call in which execs spoke for just 12 minutes and took no questions. Traders took note Tuesday morning: the bank’s stock is now down about 90 percent from early March. Last month, 11 of Wall Street’s biggest banks including JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America and Wells Fargo deposited a combined $30 billion lifeline into First Republic in what they hoped would be seen as “a vote of confidence for First Republic and the entire U.S. banking system.”

https://www.thedailybeast.com/first-republic-banks-stock-tanks-after-losing-dollar102-billion-in-customer-deposits?

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Fed faults Silicon Valley Bank execs, itself in bank failure

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Federal Reserve blamed last month’s collapse of Silicon Valley Bank on poor management, watered-down regulations and lax oversight by its own staffers, and said the industry needs stricter policing on multiple fronts to prevent future bank failures.

https://apnews.com/article/silicon-valley-fed-supervision-review-30f56061bf5d103cef7e9445d50fd759

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First Republic Bank seized, sold in fire sale to JPMorgan

NEW YORK (AP) — Regulators seized troubled First Republic Bank early Monday, making it the second-largest bank failure in U.S. history, and promptly sold all of its deposits and most of its assets to JPMorgan Chase in a bid to end the turmoil that has raised questions about the health of the U.S. banking system.

https://apnews.com/article/first-republic-bank-silicon-valley-fdic-5ab48702b7136d42f73ac13e0a20955d?

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Fed’s fault-finding on bank failures could lead to stronger regulations

New banking regulations proposed by federal watchdogs don’t go far enough in countering potential problems, but could help lower bank fees and calm financial markets and nerves, leading to a more stable financial system, according to some economists.

https://floridaphoenix.com/2023/05/10/feds-fault-finding-on-bank-failures-could-lead-to-stronger-regulations/?

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Federal Reserve says 23 biggest banks weathered severe recession scenario in stress test

All 23 of the U.S. banks included in the Federal Reserve’s annual stress test weathered a severe recession scenario while continuing to lend to consumers and corporations, the regulator said Wednesday.

https://www.cnbc.com/2023/06/28/fed-stress-test-2023-23-banks-weathered-severe-recession.html?

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Federal Reserve may tighten financial rules after US bank failures, Powell says

WASHINGTON (AP) — Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said Thursday that the central bank may have to tighten its oversight of the American financial system in the wake of the failure of three large U.S. banks this spring.

https://apnews.com/article/federal-reserve-banking-regulation-powell-svb-af27140957d982315ab92ffedb4740e8?

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Big bank CEOs slam proposed tougher regulations: "They don't make sense"

Leaders of some of the nation's biggest banks attacked regulators over their proposals to toughen industry rules — even threatening at a Senate hearing on Wednesday to challenge the constitutionality of the plan.

https://www.axios.com/2023/12/06/ceos-banking-regulations-senate-tesimony?

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Top banks branch out

Data: International Monetary Fund via FRED. Chart: Alex Fitzpatrick/Axios JPMorgan Chase said today it'll open 160+ new U.S. branches in 30+ states in 2026 and renovate another 600 as part of a multibillion-dollar investment, Axios' Nathan Bomey reports. Why it matters: While few people visit tellers to grab cash anymore, brick-and-mortar branches are still a critical link between customers and banks. And banks value the visibility in neighborhoods and in business centers. Bank of America has opened new locations in Denver, Philadelphia and elsewhere, the Financial Times notes. Bank of America said in May that it'll open 150+ financial centers across 60 markets by the end of 2027, and has invested $5 billion in its financial centers network over the past decade, opening new locations and renovating existing centers. 🏦 Chase's plan is part of a broader effort, announced in 2024, to open 500 new branches and renovate 1,700 more within three years. The expansion includes new branches in low-to-moderate-income and rural communities, and "fast-growing regions across the Northeast, Southeast, Heartland and Southwest," Chase said. 📱 The big picture: Banks have been steadily closing branches for more than a decade as mobile banking has surged. 📉 The number of branches per American has fallen by nearly 30% since peaking in 2009, per federal data. Banks closed 264 branches in the first half of 2025 alone, according to S&P Global Market Intelligence. Between the lines: Research suggests that physical banks still matter to customers, even as they do more of their banking online. 64% of customers "still rely on branches for conflict resolution when they can't find a way to resolve an issue online," a 2025 Accenture study found. Plus, 65% "still see branches as symbols of stability, a sentiment that spans generations." Go deeper.

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Gloves come off

Big banks aren’t pulling any punches in their fight with the crypto industry — Jamie Dimon just described a fellow financier as “full of sh*t.” With regulation coming up for a Senate vote, the long-simmering tensions are boiling over.