(Bloomberg) -- Sunrun Inc., the biggest US residential-solar company, fell to a four-month low on concerns of its exposure to collapsed lender Silicon Valley Bank.
The company said it has less than $80 million of cash deposits with the bank, according to a statement Friday. Sunrun’s shares fell as much as 17% on Friday, and closed down 12% in New York, the biggest drop since June. Sunnova Energy International Inc., another large solar firm, said it had minimal exposure to SVB. Its shares slumped 6.4%.
Silicon Valley Bank has been a key supporter to cleantech and innovative agriculture firms — industries that once struggled to raise financings. SVB made a point to highlight its collaboration with Sunrun, which topped Tesla several years ago to become America’s rooftop solar leader.
“By 2020, SVB had provided nearly $240 million of financing across five Sunrun debt transactions,” according to an SVB web page specifically about Sunrun.
SVB is among 13 lenders in Sunrun’s $600 million recourse credit facility, the solar company said. That facility is fully utilized.
The bank is also among nine lenders to Sunrun’s $1.8 billion non-recourse senior aggregation warehouse facility, of which about $710 million is undrawn. Sunrun said SVB’s undrawn commitment was about $40 million.
While SVB is a facilitator of interest rate hedges, Sunrun said “to our knowledge they are not ultimately the backer of these derivatives,” though it’s evaluating the legal structures associated with them.
©2023 Bloomberg L.P.
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