Silvergate stock crashed 50% on Thursday: here’s why

• Silvergate Capital delayed submission of its annual 10-K report.
• JPMorgan downgraded Silvergate stock to underweight today.
• Silvergate Capital is now down 65% versus its year-to-date high.

Silvergate Capital Corp (NYSE: SI) was cut nearly in half this morning after it delayed the submission of its annual 10-K report.

What Silvergate said in its SEC filing

The crypto bank is facing an existential crisis following the FTX fiasco in early November. On Tuesday, Silvergate Capital said in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC):

The Company is evaluating its ability to continue as a going concern [and] is in the process of reevaluating its businesses and strategies in light of the business and regulatory challenges it currently faces.

The lender also confirmed that it had to offload more assets than expected over the past two months, which could weigh on its capital ratio. Silvergate stock is now down about 65% versus its year-to-date high.

Silvergate stock gets multiple downgrades

Also on Thursday, JPMorgan analyst Steven Alexopoulos downgraded the financial services company to “underweight” citing continued liquidity challenges.

In the backdrop of challenged environment, short-sellers appear to have contributed to a bank-run of sorts with Silvergate reporting a much greater level of deposit outflows than anticipated in Q4 and this likely continuing.

In its latest reported quarter, Silvergate Capital had $1.0 billion of loss.

Coinbase also announced today that it had stopped payments to or from the crypto bank. Analysts at Canaccord Genuity also downgraded Silvergate stock on Thursday and trimmed their price target o $9.0 a share.