Silicon Valley’s Favorite Bank Was Its Single Point of Failure

For 40 years, Silicon Valley Bank enmeshed itself in the venture capital community, often with the comfortable touches of a beloved hometown bank. Sequoia Capital partner Michael Moritz compared the bank to a “cherished local market” where the people behind the counter knew every customer’s name and sold them their cut of meat with a smile. SVB and its employees could be counted on to “tend community gardens, supply food banks, or provide companionship to the elderly,” he wrote March 12 in an op-ed article in the Financial Times. Until the events of the previous week, he said, Sequoia ...