Here We Go Again: Troubled California Bank Pacwest Craters 60% On Report It Is Seeking Buyers Or Capital Raise

Earlier today, when Jerome Powell openly lied to the American People when during the FOMC press conference he said that the US banking system is “sound and resilient” we balked: how could this former lawyer lie so brazenly to the American people, the narrator wondered, when in just the past few weeks we had seen over half a trillion in bank failures, making the current bank failure episode even worse than the global financial crisis?

POWELL: U.S. BANKING SYSTEM IS SOUND AND RESILIENT

Narrator: we just had over half a trillion $ in bank failures in the past month pic.twitter.com/YvhloFIGIX

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) May 3, 2023

Well, as usual, the narrator was right, because while Powell’s lies were still ringing in our ears, the next regional bank collapse was on its say.

Shortly after the close, Bloomberg reported that another regional, California-based bank (of course), PacWest Bancorp., was weighing a range of strategic options, including a sale.

The Beverly Hills-based bank – whose financial conditions it appears has been far worse than the Fed, which just hiked another 25bps, thought – has been working with a financial adviser and has also been considering a breakup or a capital raise, according to Bloomberg sources. While it is open to a sale, the company hasn’t started a formal auction process.

According to the report, “an outright sale has been hindered because there aren’t many potential buyers interested in the entire bank, which comprises a community lender called Pacific Western Bank and some commercial and consumer lending businesses, the people said.” And similar to SVB and FRC, “a potential buyer would also have to potentially book a big loss marking down some of its loans, the people said.“

On Tuesday, PacWest tumbled 28% as investors retreated from regional bank stocks following JPMorgan’s deal on Monday for the failed First Republic Bank, a transaction which did nothing to ease concerns about regional bank viability, which was to be perfectly expected since today’s rate hike would only make the regional bank deposit run even bigger, something which was obvious to everyone…

But surely at 5.25% all shall be well https://t.co/VMZbvApokm

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) May 2, 2023

… except the Fed!

And sure enough, following the Bloomberg report, PacWest – which had $28 billion in deposits at last check (far less as of this moment) and $44 billion in assets, saw its stock plunge more than 60% after hours…

… and is dragging down all regional banks with it, especially anything with “west” in its name: 

• *WESTERN ALLIANCE BANCORP SHARES DROP 10%

And while we are stunned by this level of Fed incompetence: after all, just hours ago Powell was reassuring everyone that US banks are safe and sound…

This is unprecedented humiliation for the @federalreserve.

Just 2 hours earlier, Powell said US banking system is “sound and resilient”, seemingly unaware that yet another of the largest California banks was teetering on the edge.

How is this level of incompetence possible

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) May 3, 2023

… not even the Fed will allow this idiocy to continue, and either it will cut rates and inject trillions more in liquidity now that we are clearly at the small bank reserve constraint…

oh the irony: FRC take under by JPM (funded by the FDIC/US taxpayers) drained $75bn in reserves. And we are right back on the reserve constraint critical threshold. Hence the banking crisis is baaaaack https://t.co/EvbkxvkOct

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) May 2, 2023

… or it will have a banking crisis on its hands the likes of which have never before been seen.