Review Finds Fed Oversight Lapses Contributed to SVB Failure

An independent review of the Silicon Valley Bank's 2023 failure was presented by Michelle Bowman on January 1, 2026, in London. The review, conducted by Starling Advisory Group, examined whether supervisors had identified SVB's vulnerabilities in advance of its collapse. The findings indicated that Federal Reserve supervisory staff knew, or should have known, about key weaknesses at the bank as early as March 2022. These weaknesses included the bank's heavy investment in long-term securities whose market value fell with rising interest rates.

The review concluded that the bank's failure resulted from a combination of unrealised accounting losses on its securities portfolio exceeding its capital. The findings suggest that supervisory inaction contributed to the collapse of the bank, which had seen more than $40 billion in deposits withdrawn on March 10, 2023.