Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees
Wednesday, 6 May 2015
Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis
Nexus Phase
Mr. Richie Boucher:
Well, I think what we often looked at was that our particular deal was ring-fenced. So we looked at a particular transaction, we said, you know, okay, this is how it should work out, and in a downside this is what we would do. What we didn't take enough of a recognition of was the systemic issues. I feel that in the bank in the past, we lacked some peripheral vision of what was happening in the market. I think it can happen in a big bank in a small economy. One of my executives subsequently described it as that we spent a lot of time having meetings with our backs to the windows instead of looking out more. So I don't think we had a proper appreciation of correlation risk and the extent that, notwithstanding you go into a deal you think this is how it'll work out for us, if the rest of the building is on fire the room you're in could ... is going to catch fire as well.