Professor William Black:

There have been subsequent disclosures of the documentation involved stating that there was, in fact, express pressure from the European Central Bank to do these things.

I think I have answered the question. The banks provided statements to the Irish Government and the regulators that had no relationship to reality. They were grotesquely inflated in terms of reported capital at a time when the banks were in fact massively insolvent. That is fact one. Fact two is that the banks came and said if you do not give us this guarantee, we will fail and we will fail within hours. Fact three is that the regulators were asked and, by all reports, said something to the effect of "there is no asset problem here, it is just a short-term liquidity". Fact four is that, for some reason, subordinated debt was not broken out of this explanation. We have gone through that as well in my testimony. Fact five is that, with pressure from the ECB as well, collectively, they said that if there is not an asset problem but there is an imminent liquidity crisis that is going to bring down the banking system tomorrow, we had better give the guarantee. That is how the decision was made.