BOG-FRS - Public Release, April 2023

RESTRICTED – FR 

Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco
 

Redacted

| 

Redacted

| 101 Market Street, San Francisco, CA 94105

LARGE INSTITUTIONS SUPERVISION GROUP 

RedactedRedacted

 & LFBO DEDICATED SUPERVISORY TEAM LEAD 

SUPERVISION + CREDIT 

November 9, 2021 

TRANSMIT BY SECURE EMAIL 

Mr. Greg Becker 

Chief Executive Officer 

c/o Regulatory Affairs 

SVB Financial Group 

3003 Tasman Drive 

Santa Clara, California 95054 

Dear Mr. Becker: 

The Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco completed a Capital Target Examination of SVB 

Financial Group (SVBFG). The review started on September 7 and concluded on October 1. 

The review focused on evaluating capital adequacy and capital planning practices against 

applicable supervisory guidance1

, as well as assessing gaps to Regulatory Capital Rules2 

expectations for Category IV firms as defined by the Federal Reserve Tailoring Rule3

. 

Examiners also engaged management regarding the build-out of the capital planning 

program and the related project plans in process. This letter serves to formalize the 

supervisory findings discussed with SVBFG management on November 5, 2021. 

Executive Summary 

Capital planning practices meet applicable supervisory guidance. Additionally, 

management’s planned enhancements to the capital plan structure align with the mandatory 

elements described in the Capital Plan Rule. Project plans to implement a functional capital 

planning framework are adequate and performance monitoring of plan progress is 

1 The examination used the following supervisory letter guidance in our assessment: SR 11-7, Guidance of Model Risk 

Management; SR 12-7, Guidance on Stress Testing for Banking Organizations with Total Consolidated Assets of More than $10 

Billion; SR 12-17, Consolidated Supervision Framework for Large Financial Institutions 2 12 CFR Parts 208, 217, and 225, Regulatory Capital Rules: Regulatory Capital, Implementation of Basel III, Capital Adequacy, 

Transition Provisions, Prompt Corrective Action, Standardized Approach for Risk-weighted Assets, Market Discipline and 

Disclosure Requirements, Advanced Approaches Risk-Based Capital Rule, and Market Risk Capital Rule 3 12 CFR Parts 217, 225, 238, and 252, Capital Planning and Stress Testing Requirements for Large Bank Holding Companies, 

Intermediate Holding Companies and Savings and Loan Holding Companies 

Unreserved Opportunity | Supervision + Credit 

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Complex Institution Supervision & Resolution, FDIC 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

BOG-FRS - Public Release, April 2023

Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco	 Restricted FR 

Mr. Greg Becker
 

c/o Regulatory Affairs
 

SVB Financial Group
 

November 9, 2021
 

appropriate. As the firm’s capital plan submission and entrance into the Horizontal Capital 

Review program in April 2022 approaches, our supervisory attention now focuses on the 

execution of capital planning workstream elements and the reasonability and feasibility of 

any required planning contingencies. 

Closing 

No response from management is required as there are no Matters Requiring Attention 

resulting from the Capital Target Examination. 

Please note that this letter contains confidential material and should be treated accordingly 

by your organization.4 As such, the contents of this letter are subject to the rules of the Board 

of Governors of the Federal Reserve System regarding disclosure of confidential supervisory 

information. Should you have any comments or questions regarding this letter, please feel 

free to contact me at 

Redacted

or 

Redacted . Please send all supervisory 

correspondence from your institution in electronic format only, copying our centralized 

mailbox as a recipient at 

Redacted . 

, LFBO Dedicated Supervisory Team Lead 

Redacted

Redacted Redacted

cc:	 Daniel Beck, Chief Financial Officer 

Laura Izurieta, Chief Risk Officer 

John Peters, Chief Auditor 

Ben Jones, Head of Regulatory Affairs 

Redacted Redacted

, CA DFPI 

4 THIS DOCUMENT IS STRICTLY CONFIDENTIAL: This document has been prepared by an examiner selected or approved by the 

Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. The document is the property of the Board of Governors and is furnished to 

directors and management for their confidential use. The document is strictly privileged and confidential under applicable law, 

and the Board of Governors has forbidden its disclosure in any manner without its permission, except in limited circumstances 

specified in the law (12 U.S.C 1817(a) and 1831m) and in the regulations of the Board of Governors (12 C.F.R. 261.20). Under no 

circumstances should the directors, officers, employees, trustees or independent auditors disclose or make public this document 

or any portion thereof except in accordance with applicable law and the regulations of the Board of Governors. Any 

unauthorized disclosure of the document may subject the person or persons disclosing or receiving such information to the 

penalties of Section 641 of the U.S. Criminal Code (18 U.S.C. 641). Each director or trustee, in keeping with his or her responsibilities, 

should become fully informed regarding the contents of this document. In making this review, it should be noted that this 

document is not an audit and should not be considered as such. 

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