At the end of an extremely stressful weekend, depositors of collapsed Silicon Valley Bank were told they could have everything everywhere, at all once.

Yesterday evening, the US government informed anxious SVB depositors that they’d have access to all the money they stashed with the lender today, even if the amount exceeded the $250,000 limit insured by the FDIC. In addition to backstopping depositors, the Fed is offering additional funding to some banks to limit the contagion from spreading across the banking sector.

The Fed’s aggressive actions, the scale of which we haven’t seen since early Covid, show how the implosion of Silicon Valley Bank on Friday could have quickly turned into a full-blown banking crisis when markets opened this morning.

• Banking is a confidence game, and if people and businesses felt their uninsured deposits were at risk, they could start pulling money from other banks in a catastrophic bank run.
• The government had a hard deadline of 9:30am ET this morning to restore confidence in the banking system, and it beat it. Heck, it even got it done before the Oscars.

However, in their announcement, regulators also noted the closure of a second bank, New York-based Signature Bank, over “systemic risk.” All of Signature’s depositors will be made whole, they said.

What it all means

The government’s propping up of SVB’s depositors means the US startup ecosystem will avoid an “extinction-level event,” as some startup leaders had warned. More than half of US tech and life sciences startups banked with SVB, and many were concerned they wouldn’t have enough money to pay employees this week or keep their companies running.

What will happen to SVB? Its assets will be sold to the highest bidder. The FDIC, which now controls SVB, began an auction for the bank’s assets Saturday night. The cleanest outcome would be a single buyer, but there are only a few banks big enough to realistically scoop it all up, such as JPMorgan, Citigroup, or Bank of America. As of last night, no deal had been reached.

Bottom line: While it appears that we won’t be reliving 2008, expect SVB to remain in the headlines for days and weeks to come. Politically charged debates over the Fed’s decision to backstop depositors, the meaning(lessness) of FDIC insurance, regulation of mid-sized banks, and how to prevent another SVB-like collapse have already begun and will only grow louder.

It’s a multiverse, we’re just living in it. Everything Everywhere All at Once dominated the Academy Awards, nabbing best picture, three acting wins, and best director. It was also the first time that two Asian actors—Ke Huy Quan and Michelle Yeoh—won Oscars in the same year, both for their roles in EEAAO. Brendan Fraser took home best actor for portraying a 600-pound professor in The Whale. Overall, it was a huge night for A24, the studio behind all six winners of the top Oscar categories.

More Oscars: In addition to the awards, viewers were treated to performances by Rihanna and an oddly close-up performance by Lady Gaga. However, those two megastars were ultimately upstaged by “Naatu Naatu” from RRR, which became the first song from an Indian film to win best original song. By the time the show concluded (way too late), the newly formed Oscars crisis team had not been called into action, since no shenanigans like last year’s slap occurred during the broadcast.

Saudi Aramco made how much? “This is probably the highest net income ever recorded in the corporate world,” Saudi Aramco’s CEO Amin Nasser said, and he might have a point: The state-owned oil giant brought in an astonishing $161.1 billion in net income in 2022, up 46.5% from the previous year. Rising oil prices lifted all energy companies last year, but Aramco was on another level, raking in almost triple ExxonMobil’s 2022 profits (which were a record for any Western oil company).

A scandal has erupted in Britain at the intersection of TV, sports, and politics.

This weekend, the BBC was forced to pull much of its sports coverage following a boycott by anchors and commentators in solidarity with Gary Lineker.

Lineker, a former star soccer player and now a hugely popular TV presenter, was suspended by the BBC on Friday for a tweet that criticized the UK government’s immigration proposal to stop asylum-seekers from coming into the country via boats.

The BBC said that Lineker’s tweet violated its impartiality guidelines and suspended him from his hosting duties at Match of the Day, a beloved soccer program that’s been around since the ’60s (imagine the glory days of NFL PrimeTime, but with 100x the cultural cache).

Chaos ensued. To support Lineker, other BBC on-air talent didn’t show up for work this weekend, causing the network to scramble to fill in programming. It even aired a prerecorded podcast on the radio instead of live soccer coverage.

The political fallout: Lineker’s suspension sparked a debate over the BBC’s independence from the government, with critics accusing it of caving to pressure from conservative lawmakers. Even Prime Minister Rishi Sunak weighed in, defending the government’s immigration proposal and expressing hope that Lineker and the BBC would work things out.

While SVB headlines will likely dominate the week ahead, plenty of other major events are happening…

March Madness: Let’s go dancing. The brackets are set for the men’s and women’s NCAA college basketball tournaments, which kick off later this week. My Final Four picks for the men’s tourney: Alabama, Houston, Marquette, and UConn.

Inflation data: After getting mixed signals about the economy from Friday’s jobs report, the Fed will take a fine-toothed comb to the consumer price index, which drops tomorrow.

Biggg week for Irish pubs. Not only is March Madness kicking off, but Saint Patrick’s Day is on Friday. It’s basically an unofficial three-day weekend.

Everything else…

• Tomorrow is Pi Day. Here’s a song that can help you memorize the first 100 digits.
• Ted Lasso’s third and final season premieres this week. (Here’s the trailer.)
• Beware: Wednesday is the Ides of March.

Stat: The Instant Pot is almost as washed-up as Kenny Powers. After sales of electronic multicooker devices reached $758 million in 2020, they plummeted by 50% last year, according to NPD Group (and Instant Pot accounts for the majority of this category, per the WSJ). It seems as though every household that wanted an Instant Pot already has one or has moved on to other shiny kitchen appliances, like air fryers.

Quote: “YOU SHOULD BE ABSOLUTELY TERRIFIED RIGHT NOW”

Over the weekend, entrepreneur Jason Calacanis and other startup investors raised alarms on Twitter (sometimes in all caps) about the potentially disastrous consequences of SVB’s collapse and implored Janet Yellen & Co. to step in to protect depositors. Critics were quick to label these SOS calls to the government hypocritical, reminding everyone of investors’ traditionally libertarian, get-the-government-out-of-my-business views. One thing we know for sure: The reactions to SVB’s collapse only deepened the animosity between tech investors and the media.

Read: Samsung “space zoom” moon shots are fake, and here is the proof. (Reddit)

Yeehaw: Here are the 500 best country and western songs of the last century.

How to say you’re sorry: The six-and-a-half components that make up a good apology.

The ride of many lifetimes. A YouTuber built a roller coaster on Roller Coaster Tycoon 2 that will outlast the universe.

Productivity tip: The right now list.

Tax relax: Filing season is here—and so are reporting headaches. Thankfully, TaxAct can be your cure. They’ll streamline filing so you can max out your refund in peace. Start your return today.* 

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Turntable: I spy a “Q” in today’s Turntable (don’t worry—there’s also a “U”). See if you can find all 32 available words here.

Prime trivia

Set a timer for five minutes. Then, without looking them up, write down the 10 prime numbers between 50 and 100. Or at least see how many you can get.

You got the promotion….now what? Our one-week virtual course New Manager Bootcamp will allow you to approach your added responsibilities with the tools required to be an incredible leader. Sign up now.

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53, 59, 61, 67, 71, 73, 79, 83, 89, 97.

89 is a sneaky one!