美国国家公共电台 NPR--Planet Money pieces together the failure of Silicon Valley Bank

Planet Money pieces together the failure of Silicon¹ Valley Bank

Transcript²

The collapse³ of Silicon Valley Bank was the second-largest bank failure in U.S. history. Many tech startups thought they lost everything until the government stepped in.

STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

When Silicon Valley Bank failed this month, I got a text from a friend. She said she just learned her employer had its money in that bank. Good luck making payroll⁴. Everything worked out. The government made the depositors whole, as they say. But for about three days, people didn't know. And a lot of tech startups in particular thought they had lost everything. NPR's Planet Money has put together an account of the second-largest bank failure in U.S. history. Here's Kenny Malone.

KENNY MALONE, BYLINE⁵: Iba Masood is CEO of a startup called Tara.AI.

IBA MASOOD: Yeah. Let me open it up.

MALONE: On Thursday, March 9, she got this Facebook message from a friend.

MASOOD: 12:44 p.m. Hope you don't have your money in SVB, might be illiquid.

MALONE: SVB, Silicon Valley Bank, where it seemed the entire tech industry kept its money.

MASOOD: And the only words that keep running through my mind are bank run.

MALONE: A bank run. Banks don't keep all our money on hand. They invest some of it. And that's fine unless everybody panics, runs to the bank and demands their money back at the same time.

MASOOD: I immediately ping on Slack, urgent, urgent. And then we start trying to wire.

MALONE: Wire money out of Silicon Valley Bank. And as panic spread, people tried to pull at least $42 billion from the bank. It collapsed⁶, and the U.S. government took control on March 10. Jordan Husney is CEO of a startup called Parabol.

JORDAN HUSNEY: And I remember we felt like, oh, God - we're screwed.

MALONE: The FDIC only insures up to $250,000 in a bank account. Jordan's company, lots of companies, had way more than that. And so Jordan records a video for his employees, unsure if his company's money is gone forever.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

HUSNEY: Good morning, everybody. I'll post a link to the press release if you hadn't caught it from Silicon Valley Bank. But the U.S. regulators actually...

MALONE: You sound rough in that video, man.

HUSNEY: It is one of the worst videos that a CEO can record for people that have given you their blood, sweat and tears, which is, we don't know how it happened, but we just ran out of money. I don't know what this means.

ISA WATSON: My biggest concern first was for my employees.

MALONE: Isa Watson's company, Squad⁷, had more than $1 million frozen at Silicon Valley Bank. She remembers trying to figure out how she's going to pay her seven employees.

WATSON: And so I literally⁸ went to my J.P. Morgan 401(k) and pulled up my balance because that was kind of my backup plan.

MALONE: I mean, how quickly would that zero out your entire retirement⁹?

WATSON: Like, in one month.

MALONE: You hear those stories about an airplane that nosedives for a brief period of time, and everybody on board thinks, this is it. This is the end. Well, this is what happened to an entire industry. And that plane leveled out on Sunday, March 12 at 6:15 p.m., when the government announced that the FDIC would, in fact, fully¹⁰ cover every deposit at Silicon Valley Bank.

WATSON: Once they made that announcement and I saw it in writing, whew, honey, I could breathe again.

MALONE: But that 72 hours when she thought she'd lost everything gave Isa some time to reflect.

WATSON: One of the things that I learned is the power of the echo chamber¹¹ and kind of telephone effect in my industry. It's homogenous¹². The power of that was intense.

MALONE: For a small, fledgling company, it seems like the least risky¹³ thing in the world. Put your money where everyone else in the industry puts it. But all that did was create a new, bigger kind of risk.

Kenny Malone, NPR News.

(SOUNDBITE OF MOKHOV'S "EMOTION REFLECTION")

1 silicon   

n.硅(旧名矽)

参考例句：

• This company pioneered the use of silicon chip.这家公司开创了使用硅片的方法。
• A chip is a piece of silicon about the size of a postage stamp.芯片就是一枚邮票大小的硅片。

2 transcript   

n.抄本，誊本，副本，肄业证书

参考例句：

• A transcript of the tapes was presented as evidence in court.一份录音带的文字本作为证据被呈交法庭。
• They wouldn't let me have a transcript of the interview.他们拒绝给我一份采访的文字整理稿。

3 collapse   

vi.累倒；昏倒；倒塌；塌陷

参考例句：

• The country's economy is on the verge of collapse.国家的经济已到了崩溃的边缘。
• The engineer made a complete diagnosis of the bridge's collapse.工程师对桥的倒塌做了一次彻底的调查分析。

4 payroll   

n.工资表，在职人员名单，工薪总额

参考例句：

• His yearly payroll is $1.2 million.他的年薪是120万美元。
• I can't wait to get my payroll check.我真等不及拿到我的工资单了。

5 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

6 collapsed   

adj.倒塌的

参考例句：

• Jack collapsed in agony on the floor. 杰克十分痛苦地瘫倒在地板上。
• The roof collapsed under the weight of snow. 房顶在雪的重压下突然坍塌下来。

7 squad   

n.班，小队，小团体；vt.把…编成班或小组

参考例句：

• The squad leader ordered the men to mark time.班长命令战士们原地踏步。
• A squad is the smallest unit in an army.班是军队的最小构成单位。

8 literally   

adv.照字面意义，逐字地；确实

参考例句：

• He translated the passage literally.他逐字逐句地翻译这段文字。
• Sometimes she would not sit down till she was literally faint.有时候，她不走到真正要昏厥了，决不肯坐下来。

9 retirement   

n.退休，退职

参考例句：

• She wanted to enjoy her retirement without being beset by financial worries.她想享受退休生活而不必为金钱担忧。
• I have to put everything away for my retirement.我必须把一切都积蓄起来以便退休后用。

10 fully   

adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地

参考例句：

• The doctor asked me to breathe in,then to breathe out fully.医生让我先吸气，然后全部呼出。
• They soon became fully integrated into the local community.他们很快就完全融入了当地人的圈子。

11 chamber   

n.房间，寝室；会议厅；议院；会所

参考例句：

• For many,the dentist's surgery remains a torture chamber.对许多人来说，牙医的治疗室一直是间受刑室。
• The chamber was ablaze with light.会议厅里灯火辉煌。

12 homogenous   

adj.同类的，同质的，纯系的

参考例句：

• Japan is a wealthy,homogenous,developed nation with a stable political system.日本是一个富裕的同质型发达国家，政治体制稳定。
• My family is very homogenous and happy.我们这个家庭很和睦很幸福。

13 risky   

adj.有风险的，冒险的

参考例句：

• It may be risky but we will chance it anyhow.这可能有危险，但我们无论如何要冒一冒险。
• He is well aware how risky this investment is.他心里对这项投资的风险十分清楚。