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Comment by Phlarp | Hacker News Reader

You can't say that right now, I'm not sure anyone can. The government is literally writing a blank check because they don't yet know how much it's going to cost to fix.

Everyone seems to be operating under the idea that while their liquidity came into question the underlying assets were and are strong-- if that were true they would have found a private sector solution early in the weekend. Waiting until 6pm on Sunday and a second regional bank collapsing to announce "oops, all bailouts!" seems like an open admission we're in the early stages of another banking crises.

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> the underlying assets were and are strong-- if that were true they would have found a private sector solution early in the weekend

One does not follow the other. The triggering problem here were unmatched maturities of assets and liabilities, i.e. liquidity crunch. They have created that liquidity by selling some assets at a loss and tried to recoup that loss from investors.

But that was not the problem. The problem was now-imminent bank run, potentially requiring up to ${total-deposits } liquidity injections and unclear future then. Once VCs told their portfolio companies to pull out svb was effectively toast.

Bigger bank with more cash could have bought them, fixing liquidity issue. This didn't happen, suggesting that there's problems with bank's assets, not just liquidity.

Yes and no. There were 4 stages in this drama. 1. Build up where books became imbalanced 2. Imbalanced maturities draining liquidity 3. Liquidity issues being prominently voiced causing bank run 4. Aftermath.

Once the situation evolved from stage 2 to stage 3, the liquidity hole expanded from ${gap-in-maturities} to roughly ${total-deposits} and that is only to contain immediate issue, fixing books would have possibly required additional capital.

You are probably right, a bigger bank with liquidity could have saved SVB at stage 2. However, the situation evolved from stage 2 to stage 3 too quick for any meaningful deal to take place while still in stage 2.

As far as coverage has stated so far, the underlying assets ARE solid...

Problem is they're just not even a good investment compared to brand new fed bonds / bills of short / long (might have that backwards) due to the now MUCH HIGHER interest rates. They locked in at historically low rates, and had a bank run on their free reserves.

But then the coverage has mentioned also CMBS. An if you think about those, think about Covid and think about SV remote working…

I'm sorry, I don't follow the logic here. Do you mind elaborating?

I see some correlation between SV remote working and COVID, but don't understand how mortgage backed securities play into this. Are you suggesting higher inflation on the way, lower property values, higher rates, and that it was intentional?

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