SVB Financial Group has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection to seek buyers for its assets, following the recent takeover of its former unit, Silicon Valley Bank, by US regulators.

The move comes after emergency measures to shore up confidence have failed to dispel concerns about financial contagion. Shares of big banks fell between 1.5% and 3% in early trading, with financial stocks losing billions of dollars in value since the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank last week.

According to Art Hogan, chief market strategist at B. Riley Wealth Management, it is impossible to know if there are other "shoes to drop", but he believes that the majority of the negative news is already out. Californian regulators shuttered Silicon Valley Bank last week and appointed the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) as receiver, making it the largest collapse since the financial crisis of 2008.

SVB was forced to sell a portfolio of treasuries and mortgage-backed securities to Goldman Sachs at a loss of $1.8 billion after a rise in yields eroded value. To plug the hole, it attempted to raise $2.25 billion in common equity and preferred convertible stock but clients pulled out deposits that led to $42 billion of outflows in a day.

Earlier this week, SVB Financial Group said it was planning to explore strategic alternatives for its businesses, including the holding company, SVB Capital, and SVB Securities. The company added that SVB Securities and SVB Capital's funds and general partner entities are not included in the Chapter 11 filing, and it plans to proceed with the process to evaluate alternatives for the businesses, as well as its other assets and investments.

The company stated on Friday that it has about $2.2 billion of liquidity and had $209 billion in assets at the end of last year. Reuters reported on Wednesday that the parent company was exploring seeking bankruptcy protection to sell its assets. As financial turmoil persists, the move by SVB Financial to seek bankruptcy protection has raised concerns among market analysts about the stability of the US banking system. Photo by Minh Nguyen, Wikimedia commons.