US regulators say deposits into First Republic Bank show systems resilience

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Federal regulators and the Treasury Department on Thursday welcomed a decision by 11 larger banks to deposit $30 billion into regional bank First Republic Bank and said it showed the resilience of the U.S. banking system.

JPMorgan Chase & Co, Citigroup Inc, Bank of America Corp, Wells Fargo & Co, Goldman Sachs Group Inc, Morgan Stanley and others were involved in the rescue, the banks said on Thursday.

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, Federal Reserve Board Chair Jerome Powell, Martin Gruenberg, chair of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, and Acting Comptroller of the Currency Michael Hsu hailed the move in a joint statement.

“This show of support by a group of large banks is most welcome, and demonstrates the resilience of the banking system,” they said.

The White House and other federal agencies had been carefully monitoring developments at First Republic and other smaller banks after actions to protect depositors following the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) last week, a White House official told Reuters on Tuesday.

First Republic was one of the banks that had been under more stress amid worries of another run on a regional bank, and a significant shift in deposits to larger banks.

The rescue plan executed for First Republic averts an outright takeover of the bank by a larger institution, which would have run counter to a broad White House push against excessive concentration in other U.S. sectors.

The Fed also underscored its overall support for the banking sector, saying: “As always, the Federal Reserve stands ready to provide liquidity through the discount window to all eligible institutions.”

(Reporting by Andrea Shalal and Rami Ayyub; editing by Dan Whitcomb and Stephen Coates)