Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Wednesday, 15 July 2015

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis

Nexus Phase

Mr. John Corrigan:

I ... I don't know that we had a specific figure in our mind, but I mean the €35 billion that the troika had identified, that has to be seen in the important context of one of the objectives of the programme was to reduce the ... the loans-to-deposit ratios in the banks from something like - some of them were as high as 160% - to around 120%. Now that involved ... would have involved and did involve, the bank ... the banks selling assets. And it seemed to us at the time, and it was a big concern in the discussions with the troika, that there would be a fire sale of those assets because they were very gung-ho on getting the figure down to this figure of around 120%. And of course, that fire sale in itself would have given rise for more capital. So, we had a real concern that the €35 billion would be required. And it would've ... it ran the risk of ... in the event, the figure crystalised out at €24 billion and then allowing for liability management exercises and private sector capital injection into Bank of Ireland, the actual figure I think ended up around €17 billion.

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