BRIAN KANTOR: Silicon Valley Bank: the importance of understanding the drivers of market value
Decisions taken by SVB itself on poor advice led to panic withdrawal of deposits
The demise of Silicon Valley Bank (SVB), the 15th largest US bank with an important systemic role in the rollout of US tech, happened quickly. In less than 24 hours it was all over for shareholders as regulators took over to prevent banking contagion by offering insurance not only on the deposits of all denominations at SVB, but in effect on all deposits with US banks should it be needed.
This was not a run on the banking system per se — depositors were not lining up to cash out their deposits as they might have done in the primitive past. Ordinary clients acted online, transferring their funds as quickly as they could to banking behemoths such as JPMorgan, much as venture capitalists and their many subsidiary companies had already done with their deposits with SVB...
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