Fed Stress Tests to Show About 10 Banks Need Capital

More

The Federal Reserve plans to deliver results of stress tests on U.S. banks to executives today that may show about 10 companies need additional capital to weather a deeper recession, people familiar with the matter said.

Banks are formulating plans for filling their capital requirements, much of which would likely come from conversions of preferred shares, the people said. Many of the 19 lenders under review and the government are set to discuss publicly the examinations after markets close May 7, the people said.

Financial shares jumped the most in almost a month yesterday on optimism about the tests. The Treasury and regulators have presented different options for the banks to shore up their books without taking taxpayer money, including selling assets, seeking private capital and converting previous government investments from preferred to common shares.

"Maybe the capital that's required from these tests is going to be smaller than the market had been anticipating," said Blake Howells, an analyst at Becker Capital Management, which oversees $1.7 billion in Portland, Oregon, and owns shares of U.S. Bancorp and KeyCorp, referring to the stock rally.

Still, "for the stress test to have any sort of legitimacy, some of the banks are going to have to raise capital," he said. 

Jump to comments

Conor Clarke is the editor, with Michael Kinsley, of Creative Capitalism. He was previously a fellow at The Atlantic and an editor at The Guardian. More

Conor Clarke is the editor, with Michael Kinsley, of Creative Capitalism, an economics blog that was recently published in book form by Simon and Schuster. He was previously a fellow at The Atlantic and an editor at The Guardian. He is also on Twitter.
Get Today's Top Stories in Your Inbox (preview)


Elsewhere on the web

Join the Discussion

After you comment, click Post. If you’re not already logged in you will be asked to log in or register. blog comments powered by Disqus

Video

Miami: The Next Big Start-Up City?

How the city became a center for innovation

Video

Video

A Brief History of Romantic Comedies

From The Atlantic's Chris Orr

Video

Life in 'the New Arctic'

A moving portrait of a fading landscape

Video

Video

The Rise of New York City

A fascinating look at Manhattan in the 1940s

Video

What Is Methane Hydrate?

"Flaming ice" is a vast natural energy source

Video

NASA's Time-Lapse of the Sun

Now with epic dubstep music

Video

Shaken Not Tuned: Cocktail Experiments

Can a tuning fork improve a cocktail?

Video

Video

Is He Cheating? A 1950s Guide

'That little blonde secretary from the office?’

Video

New Yorkers: Vintage Vacuum-Tube Amps

Risking electric shock to restore old amplifiers

Video

The DIY Piano-Bicycle

Everybody needs a hobby

Writers

Up
Down

More in Politics

In Focus

Photos of Tornado Damage in Moore, Oklahoma