First Republic Bank, the San Francisco bank with $212 billion in assets, into which 11 U.S. banks made $30 billion of emergency deposits on March 16—at the U.S. Treasury and Federal Reserve’s insistence—had its vital signs turn downward this past week, which could initiate another rupture in the world financial bubble.
Reuters in an April 4 article, “Betting Against First Republic, Short Sellers Made $848 Million in March,” reported that “Short sellers made a whopping $848 million in … profit by betting against beleaguered First Republic Bank in March, financial data company Ortex said” on April 4. Short-sellers are international financial sharks that bet that a company’s stock will fall; if enough short-sellers, in a group, bet that a company’s stock will fall in value, and the company is weak, and word that short-selling is underway spreads through the market, that will cause that stock to fall faster and ever more deeply. The outcome: the value of First Republic’s stock fell 88.6% in March, “as the U.S. banking crisis fueled fears that the San Francisco-based bank could also fall prey to the issues that hit Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank,” Reuters reported.
MarketBeat on April 3 examined First Republic’s books. It reported that as of Dec. 31, 2022, First Republic was carrying a stunning $19 billion loss on its mortgage loans. Reuters reported that First Republic’s liabilities are greater than its assets by between $9.4 and $13.5 billion, which is untenable.
