Finance Minister Fernando Haddad said that, so far, he does not have “sufficient information” to know “the size of the problem” caused by the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank, in the United States.
The closure of the two banks was announced by US financial authorities. Silicon had a strong presence in financing startups and had bankruptcy announced on Friday (10). The closure of Signature Bank was announced this Sunday (12).
Haddad said that he discussed the subject with the president of the Central Bank, Roberto Campos Neto, over the weekend. “I have also been talking to the Brazilian financial system and Brazilian banks to find out what their perception of risk is. What I can say is that, firstly, the information is still not enough for us to know the size of the problem”, said the minister today (13) during his participation in the E Agora Brasil event, promoted in Brasília by the Globo group.
In his evaluation, the action of the US central bank (Fed) over the weekend “was positive, guaranteeing depositors”. “This is the first measure to avoid a bank run”, he added.
Haddad recalled that Silicon Valley is a regional bank that operates in a very concentrated manner in Silicon Valley. “It is not a top-tier bank and it has a mismatched portfolio,” he said without going into further detail.
The minister said he does not know if the situation will result in a systemic crisis. “Apparently I haven’t seen anyone treat this episode like Lehman Brothers yet. [banco cuja falência resultou na crise financeira de 2008], but the fact is that what happened is serious, but the Fed acted at the end of the week. We are now going to monitor this and see if the monetary authority in Brazil will have to take some action due to the effects on the peripheral economies, but this is not yet clear.”
