Home » Silicon Valley Bank: US Bank Shares Tumble Despite Biden Insisting System Is Safe; HSBC Rescues SVB UK – Business Live

Silicon Valley Bank: US Bank Shares Tumble Despite Biden Insisting System Is Safe; HSBC Rescues SVB UK – Business Live

A quick recap

A quick catch-up of the key points so far today.

  • The UK arm of collapsed US lender Silicon Valley Bank has been bought by HSBC after a weekend of negotations involving the Government and Bank of England.

  • HSBC is paying a symbolic £1 for SVB UK, after the tech-focused bank’s US parent company collapsed last week.

I always wonder with these deals whether the last thing at the signing involves some lawyer saying “and now we will just need that pound” and all the bankers have to go through their pockets saying “I'm mainly contactless these days”

— Dan Davies (@dsquareddigest) March 13, 2023n”,”url”:”https://twitter.com/dsquareddigest/status/1635189652423602177″,”id”:”1635189652423602177″,”hasMedia”:false,”role”:”inline”,”isThirdPartyTracking”:false,”source”:”Twitter”,”elementId”:”969b56ed-acd4-42d3-88b6-4f258368171e”}}”>

I always wonder with these deals whether the last thing at the signing involves some lawyer saying “and now we will just need that pound” and all the bankers have to go through their pockets saying “I’m mainly contactless these days”

— Dan Davies (@dsquareddigest) March 13, 2023

Announcing the deal, Noel Quinn, HSBC Group CEO said his bank would help SVB UK customers “grow in the UK and around the world.”

The Bank of England and HM Treasury confirmed that all depositors’ money with SVBUK is safe and secure as a result of this transaction.

Chancellor Jeremy Hunt said it was important to find a rescue deal for SVB UK that didn’t involve taxayer funds.

We were faced with a situation where we could have seen some of our most important companies, our most strategic companies, wiped out and that would have been extremely dangerous.”

  • Speaking before the announcement, prime minister Rishi Sunak insisted “our overall financial system is sound and there’s nothing to worry about there”.

    Sunak was in close contact with Hunt during his 14-hour flight to the US yesterday where the PM will hold talks with Joe Biden and Australia’s prime minister Anthony Albanese.

  • Dozens of companies listed in London updated shareholders on their exposure to the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank and its UK branch.

  • But there has been more losses in the financial markets, with Europe’s main indices falling around 2%.

  • Investor have dumped bank stocks around the world. In London, Standard Chartered is down 6% with Barclays losing 5%.

Br