Banking Expert Peter Mathews on fixing Ireland's Banking Crisis

Reported today in the Irish Times:

The Minister for Finance this morning said he was not contemplating failure in the operation of the National Asset Management Agency (Nama) following the passing of legislation to create it…

The Bill passed its final stage in the Dáil yesterday by 81 votes to 62.

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Writing my last post and thinking about Deputy McGrath’s political speak raised a couple of questions in my mind about the NAMA business plan and so I’ve gone back, yet again, to look at the numbers. I wanted to study closer the argument about the value of the underlying assets and their ability to cover the NAMA loans.

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Lady S. Not at all; but, you know, there’s none so blind as they that won’t see.
Jonathan Swift (1667-1745, Dublin) A Tale of a Tub and Other Satires (1704)

For those of you who watched RTE’s Prime Time last night you will have seen what happens when a politician meets a banker. If you’d like to hear what happens when a banker meets a banker listen here. I’m reminded of Fiona Looney’s reply to Vincent Browne on his TV3 show last month when asked what she thought of NAMA: “Oh it’s all very honours, isn’t it?”

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Wondering if NAMA will help get liquidity back into the Irish economy, it’s primary purpose?

They say a picture paints a thousand words, but this one only paints one: NO.

Where will the NAMA money go?

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I’m writing this post from somewhere on the Irish Sea between Dublin and Holyhead.

For fear of doing a Declan Ganley on it, I won’t say it’s my last. But as I said to the taxi driver this morning as he dropped me to the ferry terminal, I’m looking forward to not thinking about NAMA for a while. Unfortunately, I’m not expecting a limo to be waiting for me when I arrive.

I met Peter Mathews for the first time just this day four weeks ago, as the country went to the polls to vote on Lisbon. We had been invited to participate in a panel of experts on our objections to NAMA. It’s funny how such chance encounters can change your plans. Peter has been very generous with his time and helped me get up the learning curve on the technicalities of our banking crisis. My head now understood what my gut was telling me. And in what might best be described as a Quixotic exercise, I did what I could to help Peter get his message out there.

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The anger at last night’s political cabaret in Temple Bar, Leviathan, was palpable. And with my partiality clearly stated, the defenders of NAMA did not hold themselves to account well. The evening got off to an entertaining start, with the best of political satire as only the Irish know how, all resonating with the opinion that NAMA is closer to criminal theft than the contrary.

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In his public lecture in the RDS last week, Banking Expert, Peter Mathews, holds up a copy of the NAMA Bill and its Supplementary Information and highlights the lack of an overview as listed in the Table of Contents as occurring in ‘Section 5 Covered Institutions – An Overview’ on page 33.

Peter has prepared the kind of overview that our legislators should be looking at before they consider supporting the NAMA Bill. It makes for frightening reading.

What's going into NAMA

To see all the graphs: download

from leviathan.ie:

Leviathan Special: “NAMA: The Only Show in Town or Criminal Theft?”

The Government has proposed a National Assets Management Agency as a solution to the banking crisis. Its supporters describe it as “the only show in town” but increasing numbers of critics are calling it the biggest theft ever perpetrated on the Irish taxpayer.

On Wednesday October 28th, David McWilliams hosts a panel including Green Party finance spokesperson Senator Dan Boyle; Frank Fahey TD, member of the Oireachtas Select Committee on Finance and the Public Service; banking expert Peter Matthews; and Margaret E. Ward of The Irish Times to explain the plan and help the audience separate the fact from the fiction.

Also featuring satire from Paddy Cullivan, The Emergency: Live and a new film from Doris/Magee.

Tickets available now at €17.50 (including booking fee) at Tickets.ie

Karl Whelan kindly gave our event last night a plug on the Irish Economy blog and there are plenty of comments there from people who attended the event.

Thanks again to those who ventured out last night.