Traders work on the floor at the New York Stock Exchange in New York, Wednesday, March 15, 2023. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)
NEW YORK (AP) – Stocks of smaller U.S. banks are continuing to tumble as Wall Street hunts for what may be next to crack in the struggling industry. Overall the stock market opened lower Thursday, but the losses were more modest. The S&P 500 fell 0.3% in early trading following a whirlwind several days dominated by a growing banking crisis on both sides of the Atlantic. The Dow and the Nasdaq also fell. European stocks gave up early gains and turned mixed after the European Central Bank made a big interest rate increase. Treasury yields moved lower as investors sought safer places to park cash.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP’s earlier story follows below.
Wall Street drifted lower before the bell Thursday, even as European shares got a boost after Credit Suisse said it would borrow up to $54 billion from Switzerland’s central bank to shore up its finances, possibly easing worries about a bank crisis following the failure of two U.S. lenders.
Futures for the Dow Jones Industrial Average were off 0.3% before the bell and futures for the S&P 500 dipped 0.1%.
Credit Suisse’s shares soared 30% on Thursday after it announced the loan, bolstering confidence as fears about the banking system moved from the U.S. to Europe.
It was a massive swing from a day earlier, when shares of Switzerland’s second-largest commercial bank plunged 30% on the SIX stock exchange after its biggest shareholder said it would not put more money into Credit Suisse.
That dragged down other European banks after the collapse of some U.S. banks stirred fears about the health of global banks. European bank shares recovered a bit Thursday, with the Euro Stoxx Banks index of 21 leading lenders up 1.6%, following a steep 8.4% drop Wednesday. Bank stalwarts like Commerzbank, Santander, Unicredit and Raiffaisen all rose more than 2%.
“Expect confidence to remain fragile,” Chris Turner, Francesco Pesole and Frantisek Taborsky of ING said in a report.
Back in the U.S., regional bank shares tumbled again in off-hours trading, led by San Francisco’s First Republic, which slid another 28% during off-hours after S&P downgraded it late Wednesday, saying it had an elevated risk of withdrawals.
Its share price plunge reignited worries about the global industry after Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank collapsed in the second- and third-biggest U.S. bank failures in history.
S&P estimated that about 68% of First Republic’s deposit base – about $120 billion – was above the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. insurance limit of $250,000 and “most susceptible to withdrawal.”
First Republic shares fell 21% on Wednesday and have lost about 80% of its value since last week.
Other regional banks fell between 2% and 5%, but major U.S. banks held steady before markets opened on Thursday.
The turmoil over banks will complicate a European Central Bank decision due to be announced Thursday about another possible interest rate hike, they said. It is “casting doubts on whether policymakers will raise rates at all,” they said.
In early trading, the FTSE 100 in London gained 1.1%, the DAX in Frankfurt rose 0.9% and the CAC 40 in Paris jumped 1.3%.
In Asia, the Nikkei 225 in Tokyo retreated 0.8% to 27,010.61. Mizuho Bank was down 3.9%, while Resona Holdings, a major second-tier bank, lost 4.8%.
The Hang Seng in Hong Kong shed 1.7% to 19,203.91. Standard Chartered Plc lost 5.4% and HSBC was 2.4% lower.
The Shanghai Composite Index lost 1.1% to 3,226.89 after government data Wednesday showed the Chinese economy is recovering more slowly than expected following the lifting of anti-virus controls.
The Kospi in Seoul was off less than 0.1% at 2,377.91 and Sydney’s S&P-ASX 200 sank 1.5% to 6,965.50.
China’s banks don’t face the same pressures as foreign lenders because Beijing has held its benchmark lending rate steady since mid-2022 and keeps the country sealed off from global capital flows.
U.S. banks are struggling after the Federal Reserve’s fastest series of rate hikes in decades caused prices of assets on their balance sheets to decline.
Stress in the financial system could push the Fed to hold off on hiking rates at its meeting next week or at least refrain from the larger rate hike it had been potentially signaling. But inflation at 6% in February still is well above the Fed’s 2% target.
Weaker-than-expected economic reports released Wednesday may have allayed some of those worries.
One showed that inflation at the wholesale level slowed by much more last month than economists expected.
Other data showed that U.S. spending at retailers fell by more than expected last month. Such data could raise worries about a recession on the horizon, but they may also take some pressure off inflation in the near term.
Elsewhere, Treasury yields stabilized somewhat, with the 2-year back up to 3.97% from 3.90% late Wednesday. The 10-year held at 3.46% from 3.47%.
In energy markets, benchmark U.S. crude gained 16 cents to $67.77 per barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The contract plummeted $3.72 on Wednesday to $67.61. Brent crude, the price basis for international oil trading advanced 25 cents to $73.94 barrel in London. It lost $3.76 to $73.69 the previous session.
The dollar declined to 132.76 yen from Wednesday’s 133.46 yen. The euro gained to $1.0614 from $1.0586.
On Wednesday, the Dow lost 0.9% and the Nasdaq composite closed up 0.1%.
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McDonald reported from Beijing; Ott reported from Silver Spring, Md.
