Mr. Brian Cowen:

Well, I think that probably they were looking at the economic performance in the economy and relatively full employment and all the rest of it and saying to themselves that, you know, looking at the accounts of these banks and they seemed to be very profitable and there seemed to be good asset quality ... and when you look at all these traditional headings, if you like, as to what is the status of a bank's relative economic health, it seemed that we were in a good position. When you look at even Central Bank reports where their IMF bank performance indices - there might be 15 or 20 of them - and even in difficulties ... when we were in the height of our credit or lending growth phase, these Irish banks were passing muster in 12 or 13 of these 15 categories. What does that tell you? I don't know what it tells me. I think that just there was a belief in good times that banks seemed to be a good business to be in and they seemed to be doing well and there was no indication that they were in trouble. And, as I say, this silently ... this misjudgement of risk is what's behind all of these miscalculations from a whole slew of actors.