House and Senate Hearings on Recent Bank Failures

On March 28 and 29, the Senate Banking Committee and the House Financial Services Committee held hearings on the recent banking failures and the federal regulatory response that followed. The witnesses included FDIC Chairman Martin Gruenberg, Federal Reserve Vice Chair Michael Barr, and Treasury’s Undersecretary for Domestic Finance Nellie Liang. Democrats largely commended regulators for their quick response to the bank failures and action to prevent further ones, blaming these failures on internal bank mismanagement and lack of regulatory authority due to the rollback of S. 2155. Republicans focused their scrutiny on regulators’ failure to prevent the latest events and banks’ mismanagement of risk.

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