SVB’s Asian customers who lost deposits remain on the hook for loans

(Reuters) – Silicon Valley Bank’s customers in Asia whose deposits were recently seized by the U.S. Federal Deposit Insurance Corp (FDIC) are under pressure to repay loans to First Citizens Bank, The Wall Street Journal reported on Monday.

According to the report, when SVB failed in March, the FDIC stepped in to protect all of the California bank’s U.S. deposits and arranged a sale of the lender’s U.S. customer accounts, branches and loans to First Citizens Bancshares.

Left out of that deal was SVB’s branch in the Cayman Islands, which had deposits from the bank’s clients in China, Singapore and other parts of Asia, including venture-capital and private-equity firms with funds that domiciled in the British overseas territory, the report said.

SVB, FDIC and First Citizens Bank did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

California regulators shuttered Silicon Valley Bank in March and First Citizens BancShares purchased the bank with the help of FDIC in a deal that drained $20 billion from an insurance fund financed by banks and run by the government.

(Reporting by Tiyashi Datta in Bengaluru; Editing by Marguerita Choy)