US banks urged to keep mum on stress test results

US banks have been told to keep quiet for now about results of a sweeping regulatory checkup into their health, raising questions about whether investors are being wrongly kept in the dark.

Government officials have been less than clear about how the results of these "stress tests" of 19 big banks will be released.

In the meantime, the Treasury Department and Federal Reserve have asked banks not to discuss the exams publicly out of concern that information will trickle out inconsistently and create market chaos, according to a source familiar with the talks between the government and the banks.