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STORY: "This is not a credit crisis."That was the message from Citigroup CEO Jane Fraser following the recent turmoil in the banking system.In a wide-ranging interview at The Economic Club in Washington, Fraser said she had full confidence in the banks."This isn't like it was last time. This is not a credit crisis. I mean, this is a situation where it's a few banks that have some problems, and it's better to make sure that we nip that in the bud."Over the past two weeks, two U.S. banks have collapsed, Credit Suisse has been taken over by its Swiss rival UBS, and America's biggest lenders have agreed to deposit $30 billion in First Republic Bank.In fact, Fraser's Citi was one of eleven lenders to throw the troubled bank a lifeline, lending it $5 billion dollars in an effort to help it buy time for restructuring.The rescue efforts failed to stop a 15% plunge in First Republic's shares on Wednesday.''So one of the great things about this was actually that the banks did all come back together because you think of it, we're all pretty, we usually try and kill each other in different deals that we're trying to do. I mean, you don't, you don't want want to have someone else win a pitch over yourselves. There's a lot of competition between us. But in this instance, this is one where we're in a strong position. We want to stop what could have been a problem."Fraser went onto add that she was not surprised about the takeover of Credit Suisse, saying that it had only been a matter of time due to management instability and various crises.
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