State regulators took over Silicon Valley Bank on Friday, putting the funds of many startups out of reach, including several crypto companies.
The bank catered largely to clients in tech and venture capital, and its failure is being billed as the biggest bank collapse since Washington Mutual Bank in 2008. While on Sunday a joint statement by the Federal Reserve, the Treasury Department, and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. Assured that all SVB depositors would get their money back, many frantically tried to shore up their cash reserves from other sources this weekend.
Many crypto companies have already disclosed exposure to Silicon Valley Bank. Here’s what we know so far:
Avalanche
The Avalanche Foundation said in a tweet on Friday that it had $1.6 million in Silicon Valley Bank. The foundation, which helps operate the Avalanche blockchain, said it “is saddened by the news about SI and SIVB, and hope that all depositors are made whole.”
In light of recent news, we would like to confirm that the Avalanche Foundation has no exposure to Silvergate and a little over $1.6mm of exposure to Silicon Valley Bank. Avalanche Foundation is saddened by the news about SI and SIVB, and hope that all depositors are made whole.
— Avalanche 🔺 (@avalancheavax) March 10, 2023
BlockFi
The embattled digital asset lender disclosed in a filing last week that it had $227 million tied up in Silicon Valley Bank. The money is not FDIC insured because it is in a money market mutual fund, according to a tweet from New York Times reporter Lauren Hirsch. A lawyer for the company, which declared bankruptcy last year, said in a bankruptcy hearing Monday that the company has access to enough cash for the business to survive, and is “fine,” Bloomberg reported.
Per new bankruptcy filing, BlockFi has $227m in Silicon Valley Bank. The bankruptcy trustee warned them on Mon that bc those funds are in a money market mutual fund, they’re not FDIC secured — which could be a prblm w/ keeping in compliance of bankruptcy law pic.twitter.com/hnpo8anrrS
— Lauren Hirsch (@LaurenSHirsch) March 10, 2023
Circle
Circle, creator of the second-largest stablecoin, USDC, said over the weekend that $3.3 billion of the around $40 billion it has in reserves to back the stablecoin was in Silicon Valley bank.
The news caused USDC to depeg from the the dollar, falling to a low of about 87 cents before regaining its peg on the news that the government would backstop deposits.
On Sunday night, Circle confirmed in a statement that the billions locked up in SVB were safe. The USDC stablecoin was back to trading at around 99 cents as of Monday.
1/ Following the confirmation at the end of today that the wires initiated on Thursday to remove balances were not yet processed, $3.3 billion of the ~$40 billion of USDC reserves remain at SVB.
— Circle (@circle) March 11, 2023
Pantera
The crypto-focused venture capital firm Pantera was using Silicon Valley Bank as a custodian, according to a regulatory filing from last month, CoinDesk reported. The firm raised $1.3 billion for a blockchain fund last year and planned to raise more this year, according to Decrypt.
Proof
The members-only NFT community behind the successful project Moonbirds said that it held cash at SVB, but didn’t disclose how much. The Proof collective, founded by Kevin Rose and Justin Mezzell, added that it had diversified holdings that also included Ether and stablecoins, according to a Friday tweet.
“While this news sucks, it doesn’t affect your wallet or our roadmap,” the Proof Collective wrote.
1/5: A statement from the PROOF team regarding SVB:
— PROOF (🥃,🦉) (@proof_xyz) March 10, 2023
Many of you have seen the headlines this morning about the Silicon Valley Bank closure. The most important thing to us—in both good times and bad—is to communicate with our community proactively and transparently. 🧵:
Ripple
Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse said in a Sunday tweet that the company had some exposure to SVB without saying how much. The executive said he expected no disruption to business and added that Ripple “already held a majority of our USD w/ a broader network of bank partners.”
Setting the record straight on SVB Qs:
— Brad Garlinghouse (@bgarlinghouse) March 12, 2023
Ripple had some exposure to SVB – it was a banking partner, and held some of our cash balance. Fortunately, we expect NO disruption to our day-to-day business, and already held a majority of our USD w/ a broader network of bank partners.
Yuga Labs
The company behind the popular NFT collection Bored Ape Yacht Club also has “super limited financial exposure,” to SVB, according to a discord message from founder Greg Solano. He added that having funds with the failed bank “doesn’t impact our business or plans in any way,” according to a screenshot of the discord message.
A spokesperson for Yuga Labs confirmed the authenticity of the discord message but declined to comment further.
.@CryptoGarga confirms that @yugalabs will be unimpacted by the Silicon Valley Bank collapse! Pic.twitter.com/FvFfdctKVO
— Zuwu (@0xZuwu) March 10, 2023
