Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen will testify on the White House’s fiscal 2024 budget before the Senate Finance Committee on Thursday. In 2024 budget testimony before the House Ways and Means Committee on Friday, Yellen warned lawmakers that a default by the United States on its debt due to a failure to raise the federal debt ceiling would “produce economic and financial collapse.”

Shalanda Young, director of the Office of Management and Budget, will provide testimony on the 2024 budget before the Senate Budget Committee on Wednesday.

The SXSW Conference begins in Austin, Texas, this week, with a few notable financial sessions on the agenda:

• PayPal Holdings Inc. President and Chief Executive Dan Schulman and Adrienne Harris, superintendent of the New York State Department of Financial Services, will discuss financial innovation in a session Tuesday. 
• Commissioner Caroline Pham of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, along with policy experts from Circle ​Internet Financial Ltd., Coinbase Global Inc. and the European Commission will discuss crypto regulation in a Monday session titled, “Regulating Crypto for Responsible Innovation.” 
• Molly White, founder of the “Web3 is Going Just Great” website, will join the Washington Post’s Gerrit De Vynck on Tuesday for a discussion on the shortcomings of Web3 and crypto.

The Securities and Exchange Commission, in an open meeting Wednesday, will discuss proposed rule changes that would require investment advisers to adopt policies and procedures for responding to incidents of unauthorized access to or use of customer information.

Fedspeak:

No central banker comments this week as the Fed enters a blackout period ahead of the Federal Open Market Committee meetings March 21-22, but Fed Governor Michelle Bowman will give remarks at the Independent Community Bankers Association’s conference in Honolulu on Tuesday. 

Banks on the brink: Silvergate Capital Corp. said it will voluntarily liquidate its assets and wind down operations following an announcement that it was poorly capitalized and was evaluating its options after its exposure to the collapse of FTX. The bank said it plans to fully repay all deposits, while Binance and Coinbase said they had no deposits at the bank, which had become heavily involved in providing financial services to the crypto industry. (Reuters)

The $6.8 trillion man: President Joe Biden released a $6.8 trillion federal budget proposal, consisting of $5 trillion in proposed tax increases and a target to reduce budget deficits by almost $3 trillion over a decade. (The New York Times) Biden’s budget plan did not propose major tax or spending changes related to the Social Security program, which is set to run out of funds in just over the next decade, despite campaign promises to shore up the program, though he said during a speech in Philadelphia that he guarantees he “will protect Social Security and Medicare without any change.” (The New York Times)

Werfel in, Eberly on deck (maybe): The Senate confirmed Danny Werfel as commissioner of the Internal Revenue Service in a 54-42 vote, putting him in position to lead the agency through a complete overhaul, propelled by $80 billion in new funding. (CNN) Northwestern University finance professor Janice Eberly emerged as the front-runner in the search for vice chair of the Federal Reserve, according to people familiar with the matter. The White House declined to comment and the sources noted that Biden has not made a final decision yet on nominating Eberly, who served as assistant Treasury secretary for economic policy in the Obama administration. (The Wall Street Journal)

Powell, Zandi address lawmakers on economy: Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell told the Senate Banking Committee that it is “very likely” the central bank’s inflation strategy will cost the U.S. economy in the labor market, and in response to questioning from Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) over the threat of lost jobs, Powell fired back, asking if working people would “be better off if we just walk away from our jobs and inflation remains 5, 6%?” Powell also said recent economic figures were “stronger than expected” and the bank is prepared to increase the pace of interest rate hikes. (The New York Times)

Mark Zandi, Moody’s Analytics’ chief economist, warned Senate Banking Committee members in a hearing that if lawmakers fail to raise the federal borrowing limit and the United States defaults on its debt, the U.S. economy could be thrown into a recession and quickly lose 1 million jobs. In prepared testimony to the Subcommittee on Economic Policy, Zandi also said that the ripple effects could lead to a financial crisis reminiscent of 2008, with as many as 7 million jobs lost. (The New York Times)

Social Security accounts eyed: A bipartisan group of senators unveiled legislation that aims to keep Americans from spending down their Social Security benefits too early and directs the Social Security Administration to improve its communication with taxpayers, including a return to paper statements to all Americans, not just those over 60. In a memo accompanying the legislation, Sens. Bill Cassidy (R-La.), Chris Coons (D-Del.), Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Tim Kaine (D-Va.) asked the SSA to analyze why many Americans are claiming benefits early and to outline plans to educate the public on the tradeoffs between cashing out the benefits as soon as they are eligible versus waiting until age 70, when the benefits pay at a higher rate. (Yahoo Finance)

3.6%

The unemployment rate in February, according to the latest data from the Labor Department. That figure is up slightly from last month’s report, which showed January unemployment at 3.4%, a 53-year-low. Employers added 311,000 jobs last month.

1) For the Americans Actively Preparing for a Recession, Shoring Up Savings and Cutting Spending Are Their Main Strategies

Amanda Jacobson Snyder, Morning Consult

2) As Social Security reform talks heat up, changes to the retirement age, payroll tax may be on the table

Lorie Konish, CNBC

3) ‘Shut your mouth’: GOP senator clashes with union leader during hearing 

Karl Evers-Hillstrom, The Hill

4) SEC Chair Gensler says ‘Scope 3’ emissions disclosures aren’t ‘well developed,’ hinting they could be scaled back in climate rule

Chelsea Cox, CNBC

5) Lawmakers unveil plan to keep Americans from claiming Social Security too early

Ben Werschkul, Yahoo Finance

6) The Dirty Little Secret of Credit Card Rewards Programs

JChenzi Xu and Jeffrey Reppucci, The New York Times

7) Retail investors are losing billions buying stock options

The Economist

8) Biden unveils plan averting Medicare funding crisis, challenging GOP

Jeff Stein, The Washington Post

9) Bank of America CEO says ‘we are capitalists’ as anti-ESG critics gain steam

Lananh Nguyen and Nupur Anand, Reuters

10) The Boomer spending boost

Neil Irwin and Courtenay Brown, Axios

• SVB CEO Sold $3.6 Million in Stock Days Before Bank’s Failure (Bloomberg)
• Under legal threat from GOP lawmakers, Mastercard and Visa pause plan to track gun sales (CNN)
• House Republicans target the CFPB as the agency takes aim at ‘junk fees’ (CNBC)
• Biden unveils plan averting Medicare funding crisis, challenging GOP (The Washington Post)
• Effort to Ban Stock Trading Among Executive Branch Officials Renewed (The Wall Street Journal)
• Top Fed lawyer to banks: Big changes coming to capital rules (Politico Pro)
• Federal Reserve Setting Up New Squad of Crypto Specialists (CoinDesk)
• House GOP plots crypto overhaul (Politico)
• CFTC chair Rostin Benham deems Ethereum, stablecoins to be commodities (CryptoSlate)
• Binance.US Is Operating ‘Unregistered Securities Exchange,’ SEC Official Says (CoinDesk)
• U.S. bankruptcy judge approves Binance.US $1.3 bln deal for Voyager (Reuters)