WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Treasury Department has not yet received the results of "stress tests" on the health of the nation's 19 top banks, spokesman Andrew Williams said on Monday, after a blog said it had obtained the test results and some U.S. bank shares moved lower.
Williams made the comments after banks added to losses before the market open following a "free speech" blog, called the Turner Radio Network, said 16 of the 19 are "technically insolvent." The post cited what it said was a U.S. government report.
"There is no basis for that report, we do not even have results yet," Williams said.
Bank stocks, already lower after Bank of America Corp
The site, http://turnerradionetwork.blogspot.com/2009/04/leaked-bank-stress-test-reults.html, is not related to Turner Broadcasting.
"It certainly did (move the market) for a while. It raised people's eyebrows. People had associated it with (Ted) Turner's broadcast network," said Lou Brien, market strategist with DRW Trading in Chicago.
The blog said "Of the 16 banks that are already technically insolvent, not even one can withstand any disruption of cash flow at all or any further deterioration in nonpaying loans."
"If any two of the 16 insolvent banks go under, they will totally wipe out all remaining FDIC insurance funding," the post added.
The blog was picked up by some third-party news services and cited by another trader for the drop in bank shares.
(Reporting by Corbett B. Daly and Chris Sanders; Editing by James Dalgleish)
