Yes, I'm not sure the FDIC deposit insurance per se (and the attendant limits on what it covers) has actually been invoked in recent memory- the banks that failed in 2008 were just taken over by bigger banks, which were themselves handed cash to stay afloat.

It's not a problem, until it is. Mh, sounds familiar.

Rarely isn't never: https://www.fdic.gov/resources/resolutions/bank-failures/fai...

That list seems to include buyouts, though, i.e. cases in which the FDIC didn't actually have to directly disburse funds.

In Europe, there were two bank failures that I know of in the last few years that required tapping into the regional FDIC equivalents. In at least one of them, quite a few depositors actually lost money (due to having savings in excess of the insured maximum).

In quite a few buyout cases, the buyer only buys what's left after the FDIC pays out any losses. The FDIC prefers to do it this way since having an intact set of customers is valuable to the acquiring bank and helps defer the cost and especially administrative overhead of disbursing insured funds.

"Purchase and Assumption Transaction. This is the preferred and most common method, under which a healthy bank assumes the insured deposits of the failed bank. Insured depositors of the failed bank immediately become depositors of the assuming bank and have access to their insured funds. The assuming bank may also purchase loans and other assets of the failed bank."

https://www.fdic.gov/consumers/banking/facts/payment.html