The latest news on the collapse of the Silicon Valley Bank: live updates

Is my money safe? How secure is the banking system? CNN answers your most pressing questions in the wake of the stunning Silicon Valley Bank collapse:

If you have less than $250,000 in your account, you almost certainly have nothing to worry about. That’s because the U.S. government insures the first $250,000 in eligible bills.

Many SVB clients had deposited well over $250,000, and now that they can’t get their money, some companies are struggling to make payroll.

There’s no point in taking all your money out of a bank, says Jay Hatfield, CEO of Infrastructure Capital Advisors and portfolio manager of the InfraCap Equity Income ETF. But make sure your bank is insured by the FDIC, which most major banks are.

Hatfield’s advice was to divide your money between banks so that each bank had a maximum of $250,000. “Why not? If you have a million, why not have four bills and get them insured?”

In general, everyday consumers are unlikely to be affected. But the collapse is a good reminder to be aware of where your money is kept, and not to have it all in one place.

The FDIC has several resources on its site. The “banking suite” tool provides a list of FDIC-insured banking institutions and the Electronic Deposit Insurance Estimator calculates the insurance coverage of various deposit accounts at banks.

The banking sector should in theory be more stable thanks to the regulatory reforms implemented after the 2008 crisis.

The government’s actions last weekend also tried to prevent the next SVB, further stabilizing the sector after a chaotic week. The Fed also said it will offer bank loans for up to a year in exchange for US Treasuries and mortgage-backed securities that have lost value. The Fed will honor the original value of the debt to the banks that take the loans.

The Treasury will also provide $25 billion in credit protection to insure against bank losses, which should help banks easily access cash when they need it.

“The Fed has shielded the SVB disaster and averted a crisis of epic proportions for the banking industry,” said Dan Ives of Wedbush Securities.

SVB was among the top 20 U.S. commercial banks, with $209 billion in total assets at the end of last year, providing financing to nearly half of U.S. venture-backed technology and healthcare companies. Every bank has losses on their securities and uninsured deposits. According to the FDIC, U.S. banks sat at $620 billion in unrealized losses (assets that have fallen in price but not yet been sold) by the end of 2022, according to the FDIC.

The government took measures over the weekend to allay fears that the SVB would develop into a full-blown crisis. So there is no need to panic, analysts say.

Most major US banks are in good financial shape and will not find themselves in a situation where they are forced to take bond losses, DIC chairman Martin Gruenberg said.