Has a full-scale banking crisis been avoided? UBS has just swooped to take over its rival Credit Suisse, paying for just over $3bn. The deal – secured hours before the Asian markets opened – is intended to stop any domino effect that might have been created, had Credit Suisse had folded this week and started to call into question the reputation of other banks.

Credit Suisse calls it a “merger”, UBS calls it a “takeover” but a better word might be “bailout”. The deal involves $9 billion of contingency credit from the Swiss government and Swiss National Bank stumping up $100 billion of liquidity support. This doesn’t happen in normal takeovers. Most strikingly, that AT1 bonds that Credit Suisse had issued (and had been valued at $17bn) have been vapourised and their investors get nothing. This is unlikely to have happened unless the regulators regarded the bank as unviable.

There had been some quiet confidence at the end of last week that Credit Suisse might recover. Despite its stocks hitting a new record low on Wednesday, they had started to rebound, after the bank agreed to a $50bn bailout from the Swiss National Bank to help get its finances in order. Comments from Credit Suisse’s largest shareholder, the Saudi National Bank, which triggered jitters were also better explained (the Bank had suggested it wouldn’t put anymore capital into Credit Suisse, mainly due to regulatory hurdles).

But Credit Suisse’s long-standing reputation for poor management could not survive the regional banking crisis that had been sparked in the United States, which included the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank. Credit Suisse shared plunged again on Friday and its value deteriorated significantly over the weekend: estimated at $8bn on Friday, but bought for nearly $5bn less within 48 hours.

The relief from UK authorities is audible. The Bank of England is praising the ‘comprehensive set of actions’ in Zurich. It’s putting the UK’s own banking deal – which allowed HSBC to acquire the UK arm of SVB for £1 – look impressive, as there were no taxpayer guarantees needed.

So will UBS’s takeover bring fears of a banking crisis to an end? It’s unlikely: we kept being told that Credit Suisse was perfectly safe, had far more liquidity than regulators demanded etc. That may have been so but, as I argue in the magazine cover piece this week, it’s becoming clear that these regulators missed something pretty big. Credit Suisse will now be dismissed as a ‘one-off’ problem, as bad investments and scandals have plagued the bank for years. But in truth, fast-changing economic landscapes – mainly the return of normal interest rates – are exposing lots of problem areas, of which the banking sector is proving no exception.

So far the assumption seems to be that this can be managed – the European Central Bank pushed on with another hike to the base rate last week, even in the thick of the Credit Suisse concerns. But this evening we learn that further precautions are being taken. Six central banks, including the Federal Reserve and the Bank of England, have announced ‘coordinated action’ tonight ‘to enhance the provision of liquidity via the standing US dollar liquidity swap line arrangements’ – which allows a country to trade its own currency for equivalent dollars. The plan is to make sure everyone has faster access to the dollar (daily, instead of weekly). The stock-up is supposed to help keep banks confident that they can continue to lend (to individual households as well as to businesses), despite all the uncertainty in the sector.

The assumption behind all this is that the fast collapse of one of the 30 most important banks worldwide will keep investors’ eyes laser-focused on the sector to see what else is wobbling, putting pressure on not just the regional banks, but the international ones, to prove that their houses are in order.