Silicon Valley Bank: inquiries launched into bank’s collapse and UK arm
Inquiries into the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) and its UK arm have been announced in Britain and America, as financial markets settled and banking shares recovered from Monday’s turmoil.
In the US, prosecutors at the Department of Justice (DoJ) as well as the stock market regulator, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), are conducting separate investigations into the collapse of California lender SVB, which was taken over by the government after a run on its deposits.
The two investigations, first reported by the Wall Street Journal, are only preliminary and therefore might not lead to any charges or allegations of wrongdoing. Such inquiries are not unusual when companies unexpectedly suffer large losses.
The report said the authorities are also examining stock sales made by executives at parent company SVB Financial Group in the days before the bank failed.
Hours earlier, a group of SVB shareholders sued the parent company, SVB Financial Group, and two of its top executives, in what many expect to be the first of several likely lawsuits over the bank’s collapse.
The proposed class-action lawsuit accuses SVB Financial Group’s chief executive, Greg Becker, and chief financial officer, Daniel Beck, of concealing how rising interest rates would leave its SVB unit “particularly susceptible” to a bank run.
US regulators moved on Sunday night to roll out emergency measures to prevent contagion from SVB’s collapse, having transferred ownership of the bank’s assets and liabilities to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), a government agency. Regulators said they would ensure all customers would be able to access their money on Monday morning.
In the UK, politicians on parliament’s influential Treasury
Read more on theguardian.com
