The Era of Fraud Continues in America
You're all invited.
Silicon Valley Bank Collapse Sets Off Blame Game
My first thought was of the people with jobs. The regular people who, in a combination of trust and ease, placed their money and their futures into an institution of American Society that has let down its customers again. This is despite decades of downfalls and collapses and broken promises. Well, the Greatest Economy in History™ within the Best Country In The World™ comes with a lot of asterisks, and here’s one of them: most of the Good News is for people who you don’t know and for people who don’t care about you at all. Collapse is a feature, not a bug. Though they’d rather it didn’t happen too much.
Gregory Becker — the head of this mess — has been with the bank for three decades. He was also on the board of directors at the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco until very recently. No points for guessing why he has been kicked to the curb. But that sort of professional connection gives Becker very little room to squeeze out some sort of desperate we didn’t know, how could we? The government and the bureaucracy and the… policy! It was too much. But that line of thinking comes with the understanding that this was all a shock to him, too. Are we sure about that?
We’re short of commonplace investigation just yet, but there will be a reckoning. Bet your life on it. Hard to feel bad for the single person who takes the fall for the rest of them. But it will happen. And we may never even hear about it.
There are warning signs everywhere with these sorts of events: removed barriers, regulators taking naps, the cult of gambling it all every single day. Too big to fail? In some ways that will always be true. Just make sure you’re not at the bottom of the stream when it comes to that version of trickle down economics.
I don’t really care about the billion dollar tech companies financed through Silicon Valley Bank who built an empire on — hell — employee feedback software. There will be many, many smaller businesses and people. The majority, even. And they’re the ones circling the drain. But at least Peter Theil is gonna be okay. Everything’s made up and the points don’t matter.
It’s Sunday and I should relax. Stress is a killer, too, kiddo. Time for a drink.
If you missed this week’s VFD, here is a thread on it and (new!) here is me trying to make my point on video.