數以千計的美國銀行可能“資不抵債”

數以千計的美國銀行可能“資不抵債”

華爾街日報 ｜2023-05-07  

隨著利率快速上升，當前美國銀行的資產市值較其麵值低約2萬億美元。且市場恐慌仍在蔓延，一次比2008年更大規模的信貸危機可能即將到來，在美國4800家銀行中，近一半都麵臨“資不抵債”的困境。

斯坦福大學商學院金融學教授疾呼，數以千計的美國銀行可能“資不抵債”，全美4800家銀行的一半正處危險中，危機正山呼海嘯般湧來。

Amit Seru教授在最近給紐約時報撰寫的題為《是的，你應該擔心潛在的銀行危機，原因如下》的專欄文章中指出，幾家知名銀行在近期體現出的脆弱性和接連倒閉並非孤立事件。

隨著利率快速上升、人們的工作模式發生了重大變化以及經濟衰退迫在眉睫的三重‘組合拳’，將會出現自2008年金融危機以來從發生過的信貸緊縮局麵。

Seru認為，市場脆弱的信心讓美國銀行業危機愈演愈烈，而高企的利率又進一步增加了銀行的違約風險，危機並不是個案：這很恐怖，數以千計的銀行都將“資不抵債”。我們不能認為危機僅與矽穀銀行和第一共和銀行有關。

恐慌蔓延 信心難以重振

Seru認為現在說美國銀行業危機已經平息為時過早，市場恐慌仍在蔓延，一次比2008年更大規模的信貸危機可能即將到來：在過去幾個月中，矽穀銀行、簽字銀行和第一共和銀行都破產了，它們的資產總額已經超過了金融危機期間25家破產銀行的資產總額。

從5月1日摩根大通宣布收購第一共和銀行的所有存款以及“幾乎所有”資產後，銀行股本周遭遇了大規模拋售。5月4日周四，西太平洋合眾銀行和阿萊恩斯西部銀行股價的大幅下挫均在告訴市場，信心危機還在銀行業中蔓延，動蕩仍在繼續。

現在惡劣的宏觀經濟環境的已經嚴重削弱了許多銀行抵禦另一次信貸危機的能力，而且很明顯，一次大規模的信貸危機可能即將悄然降臨。

華爾街見聞此前提及，因信心匱乏，美國銀行業正麵臨一場負麵的反饋循環：出現在負麵新聞中，導致股價下跌，引發更多媒體新聞和討論，這反過來引發儲戶擠兌。

以第一共和銀行為例，4月24日周一，第一共和銀行表示存款總額為1027億美元，同比僅下降了3.7%；但到4月28日，其存款已降至926億美元。短短一周時間，該行就流失了100億美元的存款，約占其存款總額的10%。

巴菲特在今年的伯克希爾-哈撒韋股東年會上也直言，“恐慌”是困擾銀行業的一個由來已久的問題，“恐慌是傳染的，一直都是。”但他同時指出，過去，如果你看到人們在銀行排隊，正常的反應是加入隊伍排。而今年，盡管監管機構FDIC能讓每個儲戶拿到所有存款，公眾還是擔心。

Seru指出，將銀行推入了風暴中的是美聯儲連續10次加息，目前，當前美國銀行的資產市值已較其麵值低2萬億美元。注重長期資產投資的中小型銀行更容易陷入“資不抵債”的困境：在銀行業有一個基本原則：投資期限越長，就越容易受到利率變化的影響。當利率上漲時，銀行所持有的用於產生投資回報的資產價值會下降。

因此，利率上漲可能會消耗銀行的資本，會讓銀行資不抵債。當審視全美約4800家銀行時，我發現中小型銀行股本價值的下降最為明顯，這反映了它們更加重視長期資產的投注。

在接受衛報采訪時，Seru更準確地指出了這一令人擔憂的數字——在美國4800家銀行中，近一半都“岌岌可危”。

商業地產的風暴即將來臨

值得注意的是，Seru也對美國商業地產市場的風暴發出了警告，更高的利率將大幅增加美國銀行違約的風險：由於緊縮的貨幣政策傳導到實體經濟的滯後性，我認為在未來幾個季度，美國各大銀行將麵臨迄今為止最嚴峻的挑戰，違約風險大幅攀升。例如，在大蕭條時期，隨著利率上升，違約率從1%上升到9%左右。

美國商業房地產貸款（CRE）總計價值約為2.7萬億美元，占到平均銀行資產的約四分之一。其中大量貸款將在未來幾年到期，如果需要以更高的利率來進行再融資，就會增加貸款違約的風險。

華爾街見聞多次在此前文章中提到，美國商業地產可能是繼銀行業危機後下一個要暴雷的行業：今年還有約4000億美元商業地產（CRE）的債務到期，未來兩年到期的近萬億美元債務，小銀行跟隨大銀行收緊貸款敞口的可能性，都加劇了商業地產的壓力。而寫字樓的空置率進一步攀升，加劇了市場對美國商業地產暴雷的擔憂。

出於稅務的原因，伯克希爾在商業地產領域一直不是很活躍。這次股東會上，芒格在談到不良資產貸款時稱，“在美國和全球其他地方的市中心，空心化將非常嚴重，會讓人很不安。”

華爾街見聞本周稍早提到，芒格最近警告，美國商業地產市場正在醞釀一場風暴，隨著地產價格下跌，美國銀行業“充斥著不良貸款”。芒格認為，伯克希爾的克製部分源於，銀行大量商業地產貸款可能帶來的風險。他說：“很多房地產的情況已經不太妙了。我們有很多陷入困境的辦公樓，很多陷入困境的購物中心，還有很多陷入困境的其他房地產。外麵哀鴻遍野。”

上月巴菲特在媒體訪談中表示，美國銀行的倒閉潮並未結束，未來可能會有更多銀行倒閉，但在銀行存款的儲戶不會蒙受損失。

Yes, You Should Be Worried About a Potential Bank Crisis. Here's Why.

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/05/04/opinion/silicon-valley-bank-first-republic-financial-crisis.html

By Amit Seru  May 4, 2023

Mr. Seru is a professor of finance at the Stanford Graduate School of Business.

This article has been updated to include new information about PacWest and Western Alliance.

Our nation’s banking system is at a critical juncture. The recent fragility and collapse of several high-profile banks are most likely not an isolated phenomenon. In the near term, a damaging combination of fast-rising interest rates, major changes in work patterns and the potential of a recession could prompt a credit crunch not seen since the 2008 financial crisis.

Back then, amid a housing market bubble, lenders had handed out high-risk loans to people with poor credit histories or insufficient income to afford homes. When the market collapsed, so did many of the banks that made these loans, causing the Great Recession. The epicenter this time is different, but the result may be the same: recession, lost jobs and widespread financial pain.

Just in the past few months, Silicon Valley Bank, Signature Bank and First Republic Bank have failed. Their combined assets surpassed those held by the 25 banks (when adjusted for inflation) that collapsed at the height of the financial crisis. While some experts and policymakers believe that the resolution of First Republic Bank on Monday indicates the turbulence in the industry is coming to an end, I believe this may be premature. On Thursday, shares of PacWest and Western Alliance are falling as investors’ fears spread. Adverse conditions have significantly weakened the ability of many banks to withstand another credit shock — and it’s clear that a big one may already be on its way.

Rapidly rising interest rates create perilous conditions for banks because of a basic principle: The longer the duration of an investment, the more sensitive it is to changes in interest rates. When interest rates rise, the assets that banks hold to generate a return on their investment fall in value. And because the banks’ liabilities — like its deposits, which customers can withdraw at any time — usually are shorter in duration, they fall by less. Thus, increases in interest rates can deplete a bank’s equity and risk leaving it with more liabilities than assets. So it’s no surprise that the U.S. banking system’s market value of assets is around $2 trillion lower than suggested by their book value. When the entire set of approximately 4,800 banks in the United States is examined, the decline in the value of equity is most prominent for midsize and smaller banks, reflecting their heavier bets on long-term assets.

The collapse of Silicon Valley Bank and First Republic also vividly demonstrates the vulnerability of banks to bank runs. Uninsured depositors, or those who have over $250,000 in a bank, can get nervous at the first sign of trouble and set off a sudden tsunami of withdrawals.

And there’s another looming area of concern that could spark such panic: the commercial real estate sector.

Commercial real estate loans, worth $2.7 trillion in the United States, make up around a quarter of an average bank’s assets. Many of these loans are coming due in the next few years, and refinancing them at higher rates naturally increases the risk of default. Rising interest rates also depress the value of commercial properties, especially those with long-term leases and limited rent escalation clauses, which also increases the likelihood of owner default. In the Great Recession, for example, default rates rose to about 9 percent, up from around 1 percent, as interest rates rose.

This time, the damage to the sector threatens to be far greater. The Covid-19 pandemic led to a huge jump in remote working, with over 40 percent of the U.S. labor force working remotely by May 2020. The return to in-person office work has been slow, with only about half of workers in the nation’s 10 largest cities working in the office as of last month, compared with prepandemic levels. The resulting decline in demand for commercial properties, particularly in the office sector, has been exacerbated by recent tech layoffs and the possibility of a recession.

Signs of distress are already visible, particularly in offices. By the end of March, the equity value of real estate holding companies, or REITs, focused on the office sector had declined by nearly 55 percent since the beginning of the pandemic, according to calculations by me and my co-authors of a recent study. This decline translates to a 33 percent reduction in the value of office buildings held by these companies. While the overall delinquency rate on commercial mortgages was relatively low as of March, at 2.61 percent, it has been rising fast.

To assess the banks’ ability to withstand the distress that could be caused by the commercial real estate sector, we can look at a range of scenarios. An increase in the default rate on commercial real estate to between 10 and 20 percent, at the lower end of the range seen during the Great Recession, would result in about $80 billion to $160 billion of additional bank losses. Such losses could have significant implications, especially for hundreds of smaller and midsize regional banks that have already been weakened by higher interest rates and that may have higher exposure to these kinds of loans.

The 2008 financial crisis spread from the housing sector to the rest of the economy as large banks with exposure in housing undertook tremendous losses. Currently, only a few banks with substantial exposure to commercial real estate loans are anticipating significant stress from the housing sector. If there are spillovers to the rest of the economy, other banks might be impacted, too. And yet the banking industry is insufficiently prepared for another perilous moment. To brace for these potential challenges, regulators and managers should consider bolstering banks’ equity capital in the ‌coming months.

Once we get past the commercial real estate crisis, there is a longer-term risk as well. After the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank, the government took substantial actions, including guaranteeing all deposits regardless of size, to restore trust in the banking system. These steps, however needed in the moment, create a moral hazard, evoking the question: What incentive do bank executives have to not take bigger risks with depositors' money if they believe the government will protect their customers from any downside? Memories are short, and over time, government support could incentivize reckless behavior that harks back to the savings and loan crisis of the 1980s and '90s.

While the government’s efforts have stabilized the situation somewhat for now by seizing and selling First Republic, it is far too early to declare victory. Midsize and small banks play a vital role in lending to local businesses, and their insolvency could lead to a severe credit crunch with adverse effects on the real economy, particularly in regions with lower household incomes. At the same time, the risks of moral hazard lurk in the shadows. Real danger is looming, and we need to be ready for it.