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Silicon Valley Bank failure could wipe out 'a whole generation of startups'

10 points| niix | 3 years ago |npr.org

11 comments

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sam345|3 years ago

my sympathy is with them but please someone explain why companies were putting millions in banks beyond FDIC limit with almost no interest. Could have managed it themselves in a brokerage laddering treasuries or hired someone to do so. This is what big corps do and with interest rates so high seems a no brainier.Would at least think their investors would have insisted on it.

jmillikin|3 years ago

Salaries, rent, debt payments, and AWS bills are charged in dollars. They don't accept T-bills, even though in accounting terms those are "cash-equivalent".

Notice how so much of the fallout is secondary to failed payroll transfers.

Big companies do the same thing, except their cash is kept in bigger banks with more attentive risk-management departments. Apple will never miss payroll due to someone at JP Morgan doing a YOLO on 10-year bonds.

orbz|3 years ago

Startup founders are usually not all that well versed in these best practices because it’s the first time they’ve been put in this situation and it’s a distraction from their primary focus to grow the business.

rvz|3 years ago

Maybe focus more on turning a profit than burning millions on operational costs and endlessly raising cheap VC money every month?

dsq|3 years ago

That wil be the only choice going forward, that's for sure. No more cheap money for quite a while.