Charles Schwab Corp. looked to reassure investors amid a crisis in investor confidence in the banking sector, saying it remained a “safe harbor in the storm.” Financial services and discount brokerage giant SCHW, -2.56% said Friday it saw “strong” inflows from clients, as it added $16.5 billion in core net new assets over the past five trading days. “Charles Schwab is a safe harbor in a storm, thanks to its conservative balance sheet, strong liquidity position and diverse base of more than 34 million account holders who invest with Charles Schwab every day,” Schwab said in a statement. The stock was down 3.2% in afternoon trading on Friday, but was down as much as 7.1% earlier in the session. The comments come as Schwab is embroiled in a sale due to the failures of Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank SBNY, which led to SVB Financial Group’s SIVB bankruptcy on Friday. While Schwab’s stock is up 8.0% from a 2 1/2-year closing low of $51.91 on March 10, it’s still down 26.5% since SVB’s woes became public after the March 8 close. At the same time, the Financial Select Sector SPDR exchange-traded fund XLF, -3.28% fell 11.4% while the S&P 500 index fell 2.2%. A number of Schwab executives and directors have put their money behind the company’s comments, as they bought about $7 million worth of shares in the past week.
