Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Wednesday, 27 May 2015

Committee of Inquiry into the Banking Crisis

Nexus Phase

Photo of Ciarán LynchCiarán Lynch (Cork South Central, Labour)
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Yes, and can I just round that off with you before I bring in Deputy O'Donnell. We'll come to Deputy Higgins later on in the wrap-up again. And I just want to bring up a document. It's a memorandum from Merrill Lynch, it's Sunday, 28 September, it's from Vol. 1, 12 May, it's TG ... it's TGR that that is ... but it'll come on your screen now in a moment, Mr Grimes. This is ... the overall situation here, as we understand from the 28th, is that the one party that was to have the fullest picture of each financial institution in the marketplace was the CBFSAI ... was your agency. And, if you ... what I'm asking you here to do is to comment from the Central Bank's collation and analysis and scrutiny of Irish financial institutions' advices on the liquidity and solvency of Irish financial institutions prior to the issue of the guarantee. Now, this document is the Sunday before the guarantee ... and it's the Merrill Lynch briefing document, and if you look at paragraph four, the very last sentence actually in it says "The liquidity issues facing Irish banks are compounded by investor concerns with regard to the high concentration of commercial property risk in their [prospective] portfolios." Now, this would show that there are major liquidity concerns developing there ... that the ... Merrill Lynch are saying that there are very big problems coming down the line. Would you care to comment upon what ... what was the Central Bank's reading and your own interpretation of that Merrill Lynch memorandum?