FirstFT: Banks scramble to reassure buyers and regulators

Comfortable St Patrick’s Day. Struggling banks on either side of the Atlantic are unlikely to be in a festive temper as they proceed to dominate the headlines.

California-based lender First Republic is the newest financial institution to be rescued following the collapse of Silicon Valley Financial institution every week in the past. We carry you all the main points and we even have a report on how the “three Js” stitched collectively a bundle of measures to shore up confidence within the US monetary system.

Right here’s what I’m preserving tabs on at this time:

• Financial knowledge: The OECD publishes its interim outlook on the worldwide economic system, whereas the College of Michigan releases the preliminary March studying of its client sentiment index. There’s additionally knowledge on February industrial manufacturing.

• Elizabeth Holmes: The Theranos founder will ask a decide to pause her jail sentence of greater than 11 years whereas she urges an appeals courtroom to evaluation her conviction.

• St Patrick’s Day celebrations: Senior figures from Eire’s principal political events will attend the annual White Home reception.

Have an incredible weekend, and thanks for studying FirstFT.

Immediately’s prime information

1. The most important US banks are depositing $30bn into First Republic Financial institution in an try to bolster its funds and include the fallout from the collapse of Silicon Valley Financial institution. Listed here are the monetary establishments concerned within the deal.

• The ‘three Js’: US Treasury secretary Janet Yellen, JPMorgan chief Jamie Dimon and Federal Reserve chair Jay Powell put collectively the rescue deal over a number of calls.

2. EXCLUSIVE: Carl Icahn has urged the Fed to maintain preventing “the illness of inflation” forward of its rate-setting assembly subsequent week, regardless of SVB and different banking failures. Learn the entire of the activist investor’s interview with the FT.

• Opinion: SVB exhibits why we must always fear about “cool” banks that neglect the boring however necessary job of danger administration, writes Anne-Sylvaine Chassany.

3. China’s president Xi Jinping is to journey to Moscow on Monday for talks with Russian president Vladimir Putin, China’s international ministry confirmed earlier at this time. The announcement comes a day after Poland turned the primary western nation to pledge fight plane to bolster Ukraine’s warfare effort.

4. The US Division of Justice is probing ByteDance’s surveillance of American journalists by way of TikTok, in keeping with an individual acquainted with the matter. The investigation comes as western governments crack down on using the video platform on official units.

5. Emmanuel Macron’s unpopular pension reforms failed a essential parliamentary take a look at yesterday, prompting demonstrators to take to the streets in Paris and different cities round France.

How effectively did you retain up with the information this week? Take our quiz.

Information in-depth

A $54bn lifeline for Credit score Suisse has did not halt the questions in regards to the Swiss financial institution’s future. For buyers, it’s the financial institution’s unprofitable enterprise mannequin fairly than its liquidity that’s the basic drawback. What comes subsequent? The choices on the desk vary from spinning off its Swiss unit to dissolving the financial institution.

We’re additionally studying . . . 

• Musk’s Twitter: Interviews with present and former Twitter employees inform this account of Elon Musk’s ongoing efforts to wrestle the social media platform’s funds beneath management.

• Argentina: Look past the short-term difficulties of hyper inflation and the potential for financial collapse and a few tantalising alternatives lie forward, writes the FT’s Latin America Editor.

• Iran politics: Former crown prince Reza Pahlavi, the exiled son of Iran’s final shah, has emerged as a figurehead for many who suppose regime change is close to.

Chart of the day

The English have a saying, “an Englishman’s house is his fort”. People dream of a indifferent property surrounded by a white picket fence, whereas Australians and New Zealanders aspire to a “quarter acre”. Anglophone international locations have a centuries-old aversion to residence dwelling. This provides rise to housing shortages and environmental degradation, argues John Burn-Murdoch.

Take a break from the information

On his remaining day because the FT’s Weekend Editor, Alec Russell displays on the political energy of poetry with Booker-winning novelist and poet Ben Okri within the weekend podcast. We additionally meet one in every of London’s most infamous and prolific graffiti writers.

Extra contributions by Tee Zhuo and Emily Goldberg