Mr. Conor O'Kelly:

That is a great question and we have been looking at these chimney stacks, as we call them, coming for the last couple of years, as the Deputy will not be surprised to hear. I will let Mr. O'Connor take this question since he has been more actively involved in it. This number was €70 billion not so long ago, and it is probably more accurately based on what we have already done. In the background, it is getting towards €40 billion of its full obligation. We are looking at the interest rate markets, and notwithstanding surprises or whatever economic shocks might come, quantitative easing, QE, exists, the European Central Bank, ECB, is anchoring rates very low and investor demand and pools of capital are there. While it is important to show that we still have elevated levels of debt, the way the market is structured gives us confidence that our ability to finance and refinance at relatively low rates is still quite strong. Does Mr. O'Connor want to add anything there?

Exactly that. It is correct to say that despite the progress, it is still substantial. However, nearly everything for a number of years involved having our minds set on those particular dates. To go back to the IMF point, the extension was deliberately issued as longer. None of our recent auctions of syndications has tapped into that part of the curve. They are always longer. In addition, we have bilaterally, on occasion, switched with primary dealers and bought back a couple of billion in these short-dated bonds and switched them for longer. We continue to work on that.

I do not know if members saw it in the material, but at the end of last year we were holding €9 billion in cash and have already done €5.25 billion pretty early this year. We have another auction tomorrow. Our target is to end the year with more than €10 billion in cash. We carry that into that cycle so that while €52 billion is the formal redemption requirement, we are already down at close to €40 billion in our minds. As such, quite a lot has been done already. In addition, members might be familiar with the floating rate notes the Central Bank holds. While it is a matter for the Central Bank to decide what to do with them, we have bought back €6 billion of those over the past few years. They are bonds that will be sold in that period also. Dealing with some of that, which is due to come out, is also helpful in terms of what might be happening in the marketplace.

Quite a bit has been done and we are very mindful of it. We look at it first in terms of getting the liquidity. Refinancing the debt is one part, including the price at which one refinances it. Other defence mechanisms are about getting access to the liquidity notwithstanding price. If one looks at our maturity profile, we deliberately left 2021 quite empty, so to speak. It is some official sector debt. At the end of 2015 and in 2016, people were asking us for a five-year bond but we deliberately did not issue one to mature in that year because it can be a defensive mechanism. While there are large volumes to be rolled in 2020, one could issue some short debt into 2021 and then have a normal year as well. One could do a bit of both. In addition, it should not be forgotten that the bonds will not all mature on the same date in 2020. There will be a couple of bonds. We are watching it in terms of access to markets' liquidity and price. As such, quite an amount has been done as we have indicated. Some people might question why we have one of the longest average lives but we have been doing that with the deliberate view that these are larger redemptions compared to other parts of our yield curve.

What we do is very much of a long-term nature. To show members how far back these things were thought of, I give the following example. Ireland sought extensions in the European loans twice. I remember during the second extension when Portugal was asking for the same, the initial negotiations or conversations were on rolling the debt for a few years. However, we actually used that profile front and centre to argue that it would just create a bigger problem as we started to enter this period to put the official sector debt in a short maturity. As such, we now have the European loans going out to the 2030s and 2040s. That was done with a watchful eye on the redemptions to which the Deputy referred.