SVB depositors including Roku and Roblox are under scrutiny from Elizabeth Warren and AOC for their 'unusually cozy' relationships with the failed bank

• Top SVB depositors got letters from Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
• The lawmakers asked about the nature of their connections to the failed lender, according to a Bloomberg.

Major depositors at Silicon Valley Bank were sent letters from Senator Elizabeth Warren and Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez seeking information about the nature of their connections to the now-failed lender, according to a Bloomberg report published Monday.

The Democrats representing Massachusetts and New York on Sunday sent letters to 14 of SVB's largest depositors about a month after SVB's implosion, the report said. SVB's abrupt failure raised concerns over its relationship with some of the venture capitalists and tech founders who were core to its customer base.

Warren and Ocasio-Cortez were particularly interested in reports that said SVB coddled some large venture capitalists and gave them special perks, and in return, the VC firms gave SVB access to large unsecured sources of short-term funding, the letters said.

"Silicon Valley Bank's unusually cozy relationship with its clients increased the threat of contagion when the bank went under," Warren told Bloomberg in a statement. "The American people deserve to know how these mutual backscratching arrangements developed, who benefitted from them, and what role they played in Silicon Valley Bank's failure."

Other questions include whether companies had any agreements that required them to maintain deposits at SVB, and what the specific conditions were as depositors with the bank.

Warren and Ocasio-Cortez also want to know whether special benefits such as credit lines were given to board members, executives or investors.

Letters were sent to companies including Circle Internet Financial, the company that manages the USDC stablecoin; BlockFi, a crypto lender that declared bankruptcy last year; as well as video game platform Roblox and streaming video company Roku.

A Roblox spokesperson told Bloomberg it had received the letter from the lawmakers and "consistent with our process, will be replying in a timely manner." The other 13 companies didn't immediately respond to Bloomberg's requests for comment.

Warren and Ocasio-Cortez also sent letters to BILL, Eiger, Ginkgo Bioworks, iRhythm Technologies, LendingClub, Oncorus, Payoneer Global, Protagonist Therapeutics, Rocket Lab USA, and Sangamo Therapeutics.

They are seeking answers to their questions by April 24.

Depositors pulled out $42 billion from SVB on March 9 as panic first began to set it, seeking to withdraw cash above the FDIC's insurance coverage limit of $250,000. The FDIC, the Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department later said all depositors would be protected.