După vânzarea SVB, VC-urile trec la creșterea durabilă

The news of the Silicon Valley Bridge Bank (SVBB) to First Citizens Bank could mark the beginning of the end of the banking turmoil. While not all the assets from Silicon Valley Financial, the failed bank’s parent company, have yet been auctioned off, there is an almost audible sigh of relief from the US banking system. 

Nișa SVB, care se confruntă ferm cu capitalurile de risc și startup-urile acestora, a avut mulți îngrijorați de abordarea succesorului. Cu toate acestea, punctul de vedere din sector este acum provizoriu optimist.

“SVB has an incredibly strong brand within the startup community, and it’s built out a lot of very viable programs,” said Marcos Fernandez, Managing Partner of Fiat Ventures. “There’s a lot of value to be had from that brand and what they’ve built. Obviously, under different parameters and regulations. But I feel like that’s a big win for them (First Citizens).”

Creșterea cu orice preț se transformă în sustenabilitatea afacerii

In the months prior to SVB’s failure, the VC and start-up community had faced a period of “dry powder,” which may have left them particularly susceptible to panic. Already the idea of “growth at all costs,” formulated in the unicorn year of 2021, was turning into a landscape of survival.

“Most founders prior to SBVs demise were modeling 18 months of runway to weather the storm,” said Don Muir, CEO and Co-Founder of Arc. “They were trying to maximize runway through cost-cutting exercises to weather the funding storm which is driven by the rising interest rate environment which brought down valuations.”

“This black swan event added insult to injury. It made everyone’s life a whole lot harder. And that cash that they were trying to maximize to preserve the runway was jeopardized. And founders went from saying, “Okay, I’m solving for 12 to 24 months of runway” to “I might not be able to make payroll next week, I might not have another month of runway, not to mention 12 to 24.”

Fernandez explained that, due to the reactions of the regulators, the effects of the bank’s failure on the sector were low. In the aftermath of the chaos, VCs and startups had turned even more to sustainability instead of full-on crisis control.    

“It went from growth at all costs to now sustainability and runway at all costs,” he said. “So, thinking about what you need to do to your business, not just to protect yourself, but to maximize your runway and the capital that you have. Focusing on driving revenue from multiple forms from day one, and making sure that you’ve got the fundamentals around your business built out this.”

Maturarea strategiei de diversificare 

Fiat Ventures a fost una dintre numeroasele companii prinse în haosul weekendului fatidic al băncii. Deși doar cinci dintre investițiile lor au fost afectate, au trebuit să lucreze rapid pentru a evita riscurile semnificative. 

„Nimeni nu are o minge de cristal”, a spus Fernandez. „În aceste circumstanțe, dacă vezi oameni alergând, din păcate, trebuie să fugi. Sfatul nostru pentru portofoliul nostru de la acea vreme era doar să te protejezi.”

“At that point, we suggested that they get their capital, either into alternative banks or to spread it so it was under the $250,000 FDIC insurance threshold.”

This approach was the one taken by many, and in the first few hours, SVB’s depositors were seen to be desperately minimizing the risk to their deposits. 

În multe cazuri, fintech-urile au primit intrări semnificative în primele zile ale crizei. 

“The Mercurys and the Brexs of the world really proved that fintechs can move more quickly than other traditional financial institutions,” said Fernandez. “That’s proven by just the amount of deposits that they’re able to take in in such a short amount of time.”

Această abordare s-a maturizat în săptămânile de după panica inițială.

„Evenimentele recente au arătat clar că, în calitate de investitori, trebuie să avem o idee despre trezoreria și strategia bancară a companiilor noastre din portofoliu”, a declarat Stephanie Choo, partener general la Portage.

“To ensure their deposits are protected, companies need to have diversified banking relationships with several financial institutions, and one of them must be with a systematically important bank. Two of these should be operating accounts that leave enough funds for several months’ worth of payroll. Their treasury strategy should also involve investing excess cash to build up their liquid investments. Lastly, depositors should also take advantage of the Insured Cash Sweep (ICS) service used by their banks to maximize their FDIC protection.”

Muir a spus că mulți fondatori cu care Arc a lucrat au început să adopte această abordare. 

„Acum, capitalurile de risc își încurajează companiile din portofoliu să își diversifice atât băncile prea mari pentru a eșua, cât și băncile digitale pentru startup-urile care au intervenit pentru a facilita diversificarea acestor companii de portofoliu”, a explicat el.

“You have Brex, Arc, and Mercury on one end and offline banks on the other. And what VCs are encouraging their portfolio companies to do is to open anywhere from two to four bank accounts to diversify their bank deposits.”

SVB Capital încă atârnă în balanță

În timp ce vânzarea băncii Bridge a SVB a fost în sfârșit negociată, SVB Financial mai are două cărți de jucat. Una dintre acestea este SVB Capital. 

Investing in some of the most prominent VCs in the ecosystem, and with a raportate $9.5 billion in assets under management, SVB Capital is one of SVB Financial’s “crown jewels.” As such, its potential sale has many on tenterhooks. 

VC giants such as Accel and Sequoia have been left in a state of “powerlessness”, as a suitable buyer of the exclusive portfolio is found. The eventual decision could have far-reaching effects on the ecosystem. 

“I would hope it’s someone who’s as forward-thinking as Silicon Valley Bank had been for the types of products that they want to provide to a broader ecosystem,” said Fernandez. “Again, that’s what ultimately gave them a little bit more exposure… but I hope it’s an institution that knows how to carry on a few of those programs under the right parameters.” 

“A more stable institution, but also with enough foresight to want to provide services to this broader community, because there truly is a big hole there. And I think there will be for a while until people dust themselves off from this whole thing and move forward.”

LEGATE DE: Inovație pentru eliminarea riscurilor – posibilul răgaz al fintech-urilor de la SVB

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