First Citizens and the FDIC state two different closing figures

The record

On 27 March 2023, the FDIC announced that First-Citizens Bank & Trust Company would assume all deposits and loans of Silicon Valley Bridge Bank, National Association, the bridge institution the FDIC had created after California regulators closed Silicon Valley Bank on 10 March 2023. The FDIC states that, as of 10 March 2023, the bridge bank held approximately $167 billion in total assets and about $119 billion in total deposits, and that the transaction included the purchase of about $72 billion of the bridge bank's assets 'at a discount of $16.5 billion,' with the FDIC retaining roughly $90 billion in securities and other assets in receivership.

What the sources establish

First Citizens BancShares' own Form 8-K, filed the same day, states different, more precise figures for what its bank subsidiary actually acquired at closing: approximately $110.1 billion in assets, including about $72.1 billion in loans and about $2.7 billion of other assets, against approximately $59.0 billion in assumed liabilities, including about $56.5 billion in customer deposits, at a discount of approximately $16.45 billion. The FDIC's figures describe the bridge bank's balance sheet on 10 March; First Citizens' figures describe what its own subsidiary recorded at the 27 March closing, seventeen days later, after deposit outflows and other adjustments in the interim.

Scope and revision

Both documents make clear the deal did not cover all of Silicon Valley Bank's former operations. First Citizens' own 8-K states the purchase agreement 'expressly excludes' cryptocurrency-related assets, a China joint venture, the Cayman Islands branch, and the German, Canadian and Hong Kong branches, for which First Citizens received only an option to purchase, and states plainly that 'no assets were acquired or liabilities assumed from the Failed Bank's former parent company, SVB Financial Group.' The FDIC's release also notes it separately received equity appreciation rights in First Citizens BancShares stock worth up to $500 million and structured a loss-share agreement on the acquired commercial loans, scope details a reader would miss from the 'assume all deposits and loans' headline alone.

The decision in front of you

An analyst researching what happened to Silicon Valley Bank after its failure should cite the specific figure and its source, the FDIC's pre-closing snapshot or First Citizens' own closing figures, and name the exclusions rather than describe the transaction as a complete transfer of SVB's prior business.

• Are you citing the FDIC's 10 March snapshot of the bridge bank or First Citizens' own 27 March closing figures, and have you labeled which one?
• Have you named what the purchase agreement excluded, rather than treated 'assume all deposits and loans' as covering the whole former institution?
• Does your account distinguish Silicon Valley Bank, the failed institution, from SVB Financial Group, its former parent, which First Citizens states it did not acquire?

A regulator's press release and an acquirer's own SEC filing, both dated the same day, can state different figures for the same transaction because they describe it from different vantage points and at different moments, which is itself a fact worth recording rather than smoothing over.