Silicon Valley Bank: Offer made for UK arm of failed US lender

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An offer has been made for the UK arm of Silicon Valley Bank after it collapsed into administration, putting customer deposits at risk.

A consortium of investors led by The Bank of London, a clearing bank, has submitted a formal bid to the Treasury.

The government said it has been working "at pace" on a plan to prevent UK tech firms caught in the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank from running out of cash.

Others including Barclays are said to be mulling bids for the failed lender.

As a clearing bank, the Bank of London does not lend and holds all of its deposits with the Bank of England.

Bank of London boss Anthony Watson said: "Silicon Valley Bank cannot be allowed to fail given the vital community it serves.

"This is a unique opportunity to ensure the UK has a more diversified banking sector, whilst allowing continuity of service to SVB's UK client base."

SVB, which focuses on lending to technology companies, was shut down by US regulators on Friday in what was the largest failure of a US bank since 2008.

The bank's UK subsidiary will be put into insolvency from Sunday evening.

There have been warnings UK firms could start to run into problems - such as not being able to pay their staff - from Monday without intervention.

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, Chancellor Jeremy Hunt and Bank of England governor Andrew Bailey have been "working through the weekend to come up with a solution", Mr Hunt told the BBC's Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg programme.

While there was no risk to the UK's financial system as a whole, "there is a serious risk to some of our most promising companies in technology and life sciences", Mr Hunt added.

"These are very important companies to the UK, a very important part of our future."

He said the government would bring forward a plan in the "next few days", but could not promise companies would recover all of their money.

Rachel Reeves, Labour's shadow chancellor, urged the government to do more, warning UK start-ups needed to pay staff and maintain investor confidence.

"We need, tomorrow morning, to hear from the government, how they are going to protect firms," she said.

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from Via PakapNews

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