So it seems like Founders Fund and a widely read tech blog started the bank run.
A Tech Newsletter caught wind of SIVB's finances after their last earning call, tweeted out the 185:1 leverage that SIVB was using, two weeks ago. VC's started paying attention.
Earlier in the week, Peter Theil's Founders Fund, started moving its own cash out of the bank. Then on Wednesday, he asked that their normal capital call deposits be made to other banks instead of SIVB(capital call is a process when limited partner investors send in money to VC fund accounts housed at a bank, for the purposed of the VC fund investing in a portfolio of start ups).
On Thursday $42 Billion was pulled. Game over.
Evan Armstrong
@itsurboyevan
Kinda insane that this entire debacle was potentially caused by
@ByrneHobart's newsletter.
Here's how the butterfly effect happened. 1) Byrne posts this article/Tweet calling out SVB's risk. 2) Pretty much every VC I know reads this newsletter 3) They all start to pay very, very close attention to SVB earnings 4) Absolutely massive earnings miss by SVB 5) Peter Thiel, USV, and Coatue are first to send out messages/mass emails to portfolio co's to pull out funds 6) Tech Twitter catches word of this 7) Bank Run 8) Collapse 9) If FDIC/Buyer doesn't come in, in the next 7 days, potential 20%+ collapse of entire startup industry. All started by one overly prolific dude in Austin. Amazing.
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Byrne Hobart
@ByrneHobart
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Also in today's newsletter: Silicon Valley Bank was, based on the market value of their assets, technically insolvent last quarter and is now levered 185:1.
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