[Ireland's Bad Bank] Some Anglo Irish candour
Anglo Irish’s CFO Maarten van Eden has been testifying before a parliamentary committee hearing in Dublin on Wednesday.
Among his comments, Bloomberg reports he admitted the bank faced “horrendous” losses on loans it was transferring to the government’s so-called bad bank,
[Ireland's Bad Bank] Operatic structured finance
Like the plot-line of a tragic libretto, Opera Finance CMH ’s good fortune has taken a sudden turn for the worse.
Cue the ballad.
Opera CMH is one of the few commercial mortgage-backed securities (CMBS) deals with significant exposure to Irish real estate — including shopping centres in Dublin.
[Ireland's Bad Bank] The Enig-NAMA variations
An important step, said the IMF. ‘An ingenious mechanism,’ Moody’s opined.
Just as well. Ever since Ireland’s National Asset Management Agency (NAMA) announced large haircuts on the toxic loans that will be transferred to it,
[Ireland's Bad Bank] “Most of the damage in this crisis has been done by just one institution”
The FT’s opinion pages on Thursday disclose a cutting series of comments from Patrick Honohan, governor of the Central Bank of Ireland, regarding the role of one entity in Ireland’s financial crisis.
For as the governor wrote in the newspaper:
[Ireland's Bad Bank] The morning after…
. . . After Ireland’s new bad bank rolled out swingeing haircuts on Tuesday for the troubled loans Allied Irish Bank and Bank of Ireland want to offload on to it, that is.
And after financial regulators added tough new capital requirements for both banks.
[Ireland's Bad Bank] Haircut, sir?
Ireland’s National Asset Management Agency (NAMA) on Tuesday announced the haircuts it will impose on toxic loans submitted to it by Irish banks, including Allied Irish Bank and Bank of Ireland.
Too large a haircut would leave either bank with a capital-raising dilemma,
[Ireland's Bad Bank] A primer [updated]
Interested in Ireland’s new bad bank? Well, here’s a timeline for Tuesday’s announcement and a handy list of things to look out for. All times UK.
(H/T a leading City banks team)
4.30pm – A short press release is expected from the National Asset Management Agency (NAMA).
[Ireland's Bad Bank] Allied Irish Apocalypse
And to think NAMA was meant to restore confidence in Ireland’s banking system. Not in the short term, perhaps.
Allied Irish Bank executives must have had a fun weekend, having apparently exhorted the government not to raise haircuts on the loans they want to send to its bad bank — enough to leave AIB requiring government recapitalisation.
[Ireland's Bad Bank] NAMA, SPVs and other Irish magic
Given that Fitch has just downgraded Ireland’s sovereign rating from AA+ to AA-, we thought you might be interested in a bit of Irish analysis. The below is an FT Alphaville round-up of the latest developments regarding Ireland’s bad banks plan — the so-called National Asset Management Agency,
[Ireland's Bad Bank] An e-NAMA-ous property gamble
The Irish government announced details of its bad-bank programme, known as NAMA, on Wednesday.
From the FT:
The Irish state will pay €54bn to take over bank debt worth €77bn to cleanse the sector’s toxic assets and encourage renewed lending to businesses,
[Ireland's Bad Bank] AIB: the stress-test arms race?
AIB statement, emphasis FT Alphaville’s:
On 12 February Allied Irish Banks p.l.c. (“AIB”) [NYSE: AIB] announced an agreement with the Irish Government in relation to the proposed recapitalisation of the bank.
[Ireland's Bad Bank] Nationalise all banks…
Well, the Irish ones at least. And before you ask, this is not the view of some raving Bolsheviks but 20 of Ireland’s top economists.
In a letter published in the Irish Times on Friday they argue that proposals to buy €80-90bn of property related loans from the country’s main financial institutions are wrongheaded and will not clean up the Irish banking sector.