Italy's Economy Minister Giancarlo Giorgetti is closely watching market developments following the collapse of the Silicon Valley Bank (SVB), the ministry said on Monday, adding that the European Union should act quickly to shore up banks if needed, Reuters reported. "We appreciate the timeliness with which the U.S. authorities intervened and trust that, if necessary, European authorities will intervene with the same timeliness, assessing the implications for the conduct of monetary policy and financial stability," the economy ministry said in a statement.
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As the UK buckles under the strain of anemic growth, strikes, fraying infrastructure and record hospital waiting lists, Jason James thinks back to another economic crisis that dominated an earlier part of his banking career: Japan’s infamous “lost decade,” Bloomberg News reported. James, 58, spent the 1990s working for HSBC Securities in Tokyo’s Nihonbashi financial district. It was a period that suffered a 60% slump in stocks and a collapse in land values that led to zombie banks and an economy overwhelmed by bankruptcies and bad debt.
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Germany's last major department store chain aims to close two-fifths of its branches, months after it filed for insolvency protection for the second time in less than three years, the company's employee council said Monday, the Associated Press reported. The long-troubled Galeria Karstadt Kaufhof plans to shut 52 of its current 129 stores, the council said. It added that the move would cost more than 5,000 jobs, German news agency dpa reported.
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The Bank of England said it would place Silicon Valley Bank’s U.K. subsidiary into insolvency procedure following the collapse of its parent in the U.S., the Wall Street Journal reported. In a statement late Friday, the BOE said Silicon Valley Bank’s U.K. arm will stop making payments or accepting deposits. “The Bank of England, absent any meaningful further information, intends to apply to the court to place Silicon Valley Bank UK Ltd. into a bank insolvency procedure,” it said. Silicon Valley Bank’s branch in the U.K.
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Startups are facing a moment of reckoning in the current economic climate, and today one of the more promising in the world of fintech has cracked under the pressure. Railsr, the London, U.K. embedded finance startup formerly known as Railsbank and once worth nearly $1 billion, announced today that it has been acquired by a shareholder consortium; and as part of the deal, it’s going into administration so that it can continue as a going concern as it restructures, TechCrunch.com reported.
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The French economy is set to grow around 0.1% in the first quarter of 2023 after expanding 0.1% in the fourth quarter 2022, the central bank said on Wednesday, Reuters reported. The Bank of France said companies polled in its monthly business sentiment survey reported activity in February was stronger than in January in the industrial sector and in services and was broadly stable in construction. For March, companies expected a further improvement in services and the industrial sector but a slight decline in construction, the central bank said.
U.K. Chancellor of the Exchequer Jeremy Hunt is planning to reform pension tax rules in his budget next week in a bid to cut the number of doctors quitting the National Health Service, Bloomberg reported. Hunt is preparing to alter the design of a system that means that doctors face higher tax bills when their pension pots grow beyond certain limits. The chancellor is concerned that the rules are fueling drop-outs from the NHS, with senior doctors retiring earlier or reducing their workloads to avoid the charges.
German department store chain Galeria is not holding back in its insolvency plan: either creditors settle for a pittance, or the chain goes bankrupt and they get nothing at all, Retail Detail reported. Belgian subsidiary Inno may face a surprising twist. On 27 March, Galeria will face its creditors in some cut-throat negotiations: the department store chain is working on a restructuring plan under the protection of the court in Essen, but creditors will have to agree to a hefty debt rescheduling.
A New York judge rejected a bid by the former Lehman Brothers' bankrupt European unit to claw back $485 million from bond insurer Assured Guaranty Ltd over transactions that were canceled amid the global financial crisis, Reuters reported. In a decision on Wednesday, Justice Melissa Crane of a New York state court in Manhattan said Assured's AG Financial Products unit instead deserved to recover about $20 million from Lehman Brothers International (Europe). The case stemmed from Assured's July 2009 termination of 28 credit default swaps on which Lehman had bought credit protection.
Credit Suisse's head of regulatory compliance, Julian Gooding, is leaving Switzerland's second-biggest bank as part of a sweeping overhaul involving thousands of job cuts, Reuters reported. Gooding was one of the most senior managers in compliance, overseeing anti-fraud measures as well as matters relating to market conduct and investors protection. He had been in the role since January 2022 and previously held senior positions as general counsel in various parts of the bank.