Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees
Thursday, 3 September 2015
Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis
Nexus Phase
Mr. David Went:
No, of course I don't absolve myself from those. And, you know, I’ve made the point that we, we made an error in relation to, with hindsight - and you know we would not have been, we would not have been in a small crowd in relation to that sort of hindsight - with hindsight, in relation to not fully recognising the point that Professor Nyberg makes on capital markets that once ... because that ultimately goes to the question of confidence and once confidence goes in an institution the institution is doomed, you know, in the long term. So we certainly made an error in not recognising that. And we also made an error in not recognising that there was a possibility of a 50% drop in house prices. You know we ... that was far ... that would far and away have exceeded any drop in house prices - instantaneous, almost instantaneous, drop in house prices - that anybody would have foreseen. So those, those were two errors that were made and I take responsibility for that.
No comments