Washington Monthly – In a story about the collapse of SVB and the Treasury Department’s bail-out plans, Healthy Markets President & CEO Tyler Gellasch is quoted saying “This was an utter failure by San Francisco Fed. The San Francisco Fed should have been demanding SVB hedge the risks and sell the positions as the losses were mounting. They have that ability. There’s plenty of blame to go around. SVB had some of the hottest, given that much of its uninsured corporate deposits were from the ultra-online companies, including crypto companies. The bank and regulators should have been asking questions about the bank’s extreme reliance on fickle funding.” Gellasch also offered this: “We have a handful of banks that are very dependent on hot money and at the same time have not been doing the basic banking business, which is managing their interest rate risk. But this was just one problem. Others include allowing banks to ignore valuation changes for assets on their books. And the Fed not demanding diversifying funding.” (Full Story).
Reader Interactions