What we’re reading (3/14)
“Silicon Valley Bank Creditors Form Group in Advance of Possible Bankruptcy” (Wall Street Journal). “Creditors of Silicon Valley Bank’s parent company have formed a group in anticipation of a potential bankruptcy filing, through which they hope to profit from a sale of the collapsed firm’s private-wealth and other units, according to people familiar with the matter.”
“Silicon Valley, Once The Underdog, Is Now Too Big To Fail” (Washington Post). “Here we have a sector full of self-styled free thinkers — brought to its knees by groupthink. Risk-takers who valorize failure — as long as someone else is footing the bill. Meritocrats who couldn’t hack it on their own. Mavericks who scoff at the political establishment until they desperately need it.”
“Elizabeth Warren: Silicon Valley Bank Is Gone. We Know Who Is Responsible.” (New York Times). “In the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis, Congress passed the Dodd-Frank Act to protect consumers and ensure that big banks could never again take down the economy and destroy millions of lives. Wall Street chief executives and their armies of lawyers and lobbyists hated this law. They spent millions trying to defeat it, and, when they lost, spent millions more trying to weaken it.”
“This Bank Panic Should Not Exist” (Vanity Fair). “The most important bank in Silicon Valley failed on Friday, prompting a Sunday night bailout for some of the wealthiest people in the world as the Federal Reserve opened a new emergency lending program hoping to prevent the crisis in California from triggering a nationwide banking collapse. As with any financial crash, it’s impossible to predict where exactly the money will flow next, but it’s clear that the tech sector that reshaped American business and culture in the 21st century is coming apart.”
“FBI Says $10 Billion Lost To Online Fraud In 2022 As Crypto Investment Scams Surged” (CNN Business). “More than $10 billion in losses from online scams were reported to the FBI in 2022, the highest annual loss in the last five years, according to a new report from the bureau.”
