Global stock sell-off continues after Silicon Valley bank collapse

Efforts late Monday by US President Joe Biden and other policymakers did little to turn around sentiment for cautious investors.

He said, “Americans can be confident that the banking system is safe. Your deposits are there when you need them.”

Still, he pledged to look into new banking regulations to reduce the likelihood of such a large-scale bank failure repeating itself.

Bank stocks in Asia — where global markets are first to open — continued their decline into Tuesday’s opening bell, with a particularly poor start for Japanese companies.

The Nikkei 225 in Tokyo fell 2.2%, while the S&P/ASX 200 ended down 1.4% for the third straight day of decline.

Market analysts have predicted blue chip shares in London to open lower as a result, amid concerns over possible contagion from the SVB collapse lingering.

According to IG, the FTSE 100 is likely to fall around 0.3% at the start of trading.

On Monday, London’s leading index closed 2.58% lower, with more than £50 billion wiping out the stock market’s value throughout the day.

Ipek Ozkardeskaya, senior analyst at Swissquote, said: “Monday was another ugly day for bank stocks around the world as selling pressure continued following last week’s SVB debacle in the US.”

The analyst added that attention will now turn to Tuesday’s US Consumer Price Index (CPI) inflation reading amid fears that the banking turmoil could change the path for interest rates.

“There is now a massive lack of consensus in the market about what the Fed should do and what the Fed will do,” she said.

“Some think that if today’s inflation data isn’t sufficiently soft, the Fed should continue the 50 basis point (basis point) hike.”