Private lenders won’t fill the venture debt gap left by SVB

The collapse of Silicon Valley Bank left a small but noticeable hole in the venture debt market that private lenders don’t find attractive enough to fill.

When SVB went under in March, the startup ecosystem was primarily concerned about what would happen to startup and venture capital firm bank accounts. The second worry was what would happen to the venture debt market and the existing loans SVB had issued.

While SVB didn’t manage a massive loan portfolio by any means, it was in the minority of banks that provided credit to really early-stage companies based on their sponsors as opposed to their underlying business metrics and fundamentals. Most banks aren’t willing to do that.

While it remains unclear whether First Citizens Bank, the current owner of SVB, will lend to startups the same way SVB did, private venture debt lenders have made it clear to TechCrunch+ that they aren’t interested in filling that gap if First Citizens doesn’t.