NY bank’s demise: Contagion or a problem with the business?

By GEOFF MULVIHILL
Associated Press

A New York-based bank’s demise was stunningly fast. The state regulators who shut down Signature Bank on Sunday said they were concerned about a frenzy of withdrawals after California’s Silicon Valley Bank failed two days earlier. But there may have been some underlying problems for the Signature Bank, too, including one of the highest ratios of uninsured deposits in the nation. Signature was big in the cryptocurrency world. It also made loans to New York City apartment building owners. And it was politically connected, with Ivanka Trump and two former members of Congress sitting on its board of directors over the years.