211–220 of 307 posts
I’m sorry, this was an utter mess, shouldn’t have happened and lots of people share blame. But I don’t think it was wrong for depositors to pull deposits from an insolvent (or nearly insolvent) bank. Neither is it wrong to encourage companies you’ve invested in to move money. The only thing I have a problem with is when some of the VCs, like Jason Calacanis, deliberately tried to spread panic to other banks to make S…
I’m not going to be using this site to guide my opinions of VCs, I don’t generally outsource that much of my opinion-making to 3rd parties. But it does broadly reflect my opinions, you could get a very rough “general direction” picture of how I think from reading it. “It’s rational to join a bank run, VCs would have been negligent to their companies if they advised to stay” I know! Believe it or not I have studied a…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Ok, I'm starting a new bank and everyone will be able to withdraw all at once, bank runs will be a thing of the past, your interest rate will be 0.00000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000125%
Your bank pays you interest on a transaction account?
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Once the run started then VCs who had not previously had a negative stance on SVB may have done right by their startups, but yeah not the ones who actually started it in the first place.
I have no idea if this is correct or not, but by some accounts, there were noticeable issues with regular transfers which caused the initial concern about the bank. It's not like someone started this out of boredom. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-03-11/thiel-s-f...
Put another way, this is a list of VCs that prioritize their portfolio companies health and success more than their personal banking relationships or public perception. That’s a pretty strong signal to future startups they’ve got your back when the shit hits the fan. I’m not saying it’s good , but I’m betting a lot of founders are feeling pretty thankful. The bailout was never guaranteed.
Instead they panicked like children and told everyone else to panic too
It’s not a good look and it broke trust in SV.
I don't think I agree with this as a mark of "shame". Were these companies wrong to pull money out of SVB when they (correctly) thought the bank might be insolvent or headed for trouble? Are we celebrating those who left their money in, despite the warnings, when they could have potentially lost it all if the government didn't step in and make an unprecedented promise to honor the deposits? Would that have been "hero…
In a slightly different reality… “Sorry team, our main VC advised us to keep our money in SVB because it’s the right thing to do. We can’t make payroll. Our VC, true to their ideals, kept their cash in SVB too. They can’t help us. Kindly cast your blame on the thousands of startup peers that withdrew and remain unscathed. Their blatant self-interest may have killed us, but we are the true moral victors.”
"How was your weekend?"
"Oh nice had a walk with the boys, saw a bald eagle"
We don't know that this would have been a crisis without a sudden 42 billion dollar withdrawal over 24 hours