Biotech company Pharming has a total of $ 45 million in accounts with the collapsed Silicon Valley Bank (SVB). That is about a quarter of all cash that the Leiden company has. Due to the uncertain situation, Pharming does not know how much money it will see back from those 45 million and when.
Pharming is regularly in the news when they think they have found a cure for a disease. More than a year ago, for example, they thought they had a remedy to combat the rare disease APDS. They have also been busy with the treatment of Covid-19.
Now there is very different news, namely about the millions that the company has in accounts with Silicon Valley Bank and the British branch, SVB UK. According to American media, the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank is the largest bankruptcy since the credit crisis of 2008. Last week savers withdrew their savings en masse from the bank.
This has consequences for Pharming. The American accounts had $ 26 million, the British $ 19 million. The question is how much money Pharming will ever see in return.
insured amounts
Different insured amounts apply to the accounts. Pharming knows for sure that it will get back $ 250,000 from the American account, for the British account it is about £ 85,000. That’s more than $100,000.
Whether Pharming can get more money back or even all of the credits depends on any arrangements from the US and UK governments or a sale of SVB to another bank. The US regulator FDIC has already announced that it will pay account holders with uninsured assets a percentage of their properties next week. But the American newspaper The Washington Post reports that if no buyer can be found, the US government would even like to insure all assets. A rescue of SVB itself is out of the question, Finance Minister Janet Yellen already indicated.
The British government has indicated that it will come up with an emergency support package for start-ups that have lost their assets with SVB. This should allow them to continue to pay wages and other ongoing costs. But details are not there yet. They are not expected until Monday. Pharming itself says it will make “all possible efforts” to recover the funds from the US and the UK.
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