Newbridge Credit Union's "Special Manager"

Fulton Crown

Anyone wrote: »

So irregardless of how well they are run, you want them closed based on asset size? The difficulty in regulation is only down to lack of staff in Dame Street.

The other risks are there no matter what the size of the Credit Union. Internal controls and managing the risk associated with any cash business is the way to minimise fraud. Closure of a well run/profitable business is a pretty extreme method of risk control, dont you think?

No pal...not only on asset size.

Surely you can see it would be easier to regulate a smaller number of bigger professionally run Cr Unions than a plethora of smaller unions run in the main by well meaning amateurs ?

For example take a large shopping centre ...you could conceivably have three well run and profitable bookshops run by the same company in operation....but it wouldn't make sense would it ?

Just common economic sense pilgrim.....ummm ?

Anyone

Fulton Crown wrote: »

No pal...not only on asset size.

Surely you can see it would be easier to regulate a smaller number of bigger professionally run Cr Unions than a plethora of smaller unions run in the main by well meaning amateurs ?

For example take a large shopping centre ...you could conceivably have three well run and profitable bookshops run by the same company in operation....but it wouldn't make sense would it ?

Just common economic sense pilgrim.....ummm ?

The sheer notion of closing profiable business's because its easier to regulate is beyond idiotic and very Dame Street.

whitleydonal

Well intentioned amateurs seem to have done a good job for the last fiftyyears and now are going to be wrecked by regulation and suits from Dame Street.

The bottom line is that banks do not like credit unions and as we knowFinancial Regulators aspire to work for banks or sit on their boards one day it’sknown as the magic circle

ressem

Fulton Crown wrote: »

Surely you can see it would be easier to regulate a smaller number of bigger professionally run Cr Unions than a plethora of smaller unions run in the main by well meaning amateurs ?

For example take a large shopping centre ...you could conceivably have three well run and profitable bookshops run by the same company in operation....but it wouldn't make sense would it ?

Audited properly and competently run I think is what we want with a set of audit rules and management rules that reflect the mistakes discovered over the last number of years.

The credit unions were professionally audited, looking for the common mistakes of a previous era.

If the bookshops serve different sections of the population, then they can co-exist. Some of the small institutions are in locations where the bank has shut down it's branch increasing the credit union's viability and importance.

Credit unions that are restricted to a specific profession like the Garda one are more likely to have a shock than ones with the loans across the general community.

What will come out in the wash over the next few years is how much of the bad loan books turns out to be realized or how much is due to the changing accountancy methods. This will show up as excessive unsustainable profits in some credit unions if loans in 3 month arrears turn out to be worth more than 100% write-offs.

Carawaystick

Can Newbridge Credit union members liquidate their holdings in Newbridge CU?

If I'd the option of money on deposit at > 0% or not getting a dividend at a CU, I'd split.

badgerbroc11

Looks like the folks in Newbridge are still under the thumb of the regulator, the high court today has extended the appointment of the special manager.

http://www.finance.gov.ie/viewdoc.asp?DocID=7479

But all not lost, he's only going to charge €9,500 + VAT per week for the next 26 weeks which means he'll only earn €300,000 which will bring the total fees of the special manager to approx €1.5million for 18 months work.

If Newbridge wasn't in financial trouble before the appointment, they are now!!

I don't understand how the people of Newbridge are not up in arms about this. Whey haven't they marched on the offices of the central bank and demanded answers??

Concerned Member

WHY DID THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS NOT APPEAL THE DECISION TO APPOINT THE "SPECIAL MANAGER"?

WERE THEY CONVENIENTLY COVERING THEMSELVES FROM POTENTIAL FUTURE QUESTIONS FROM IT'S MEMBERS?

WERE THEY COVERING UP ANY OTHER QUESTIONABLE PREFERENTIAL AND EXCESSIVE LOANS?

JUST QUESTIONS, BUT IT DOES SUGGEST FROM OTHER COMMENTS ON THE FORUM, THAT SOMETHING STRANGE IS GOING ON HERE.

Cookie_Monster

Concerned Member wrote: »

JUST QUESTIONS, BUT IT DOES SUGGEST FROM OTHER COMMENTS ON THE FORUM, THAT SOMETHING STRANGE IS GOING ON HERE.

sounds like business as usual rather than anything strange to be perfectly honest.

badgerbroc11

Concerned Member wrote: »

WHY DID THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS NOT APPEAL THE DECISION TO APPOINT THE "SPECIAL MANAGER"?

WERE THEY CONVENIENTLY COVERING THEMSELVES FROM POTENTIAL FUTURE QUESTIONS FROM IT'S MEMBERS?

WERE THEY COVERING UP ANY OTHER QUESTIONABLE PREFERENTIAL AND EXCESSIVE LOANS?

JUST QUESTIONS, BUT IT DOES SUGGEST FROM OTHER COMMENTS ON THE FORUM, THAT SOMETHING STRANGE IS GOING ON HERE.

The Board could do very little to avoid the 'Special Manager' being appointed. The special manager is effectively a court appointed Receiver/liquidator by a more palatable name.

The Central Bank and Credit Institutions (Resolution) Act 2011 allows the regulator appoint such persons. The definition 'Special Manager' was a stroke if genius by whomever was responsible for drafting the legislation, if the definition receiver had been used and the headlines read 'Receiver appointed' then I think you would see people voting with their feet and pulling their savings out.
http://www.irishstatutebook.ie/2011/en/act/pub/0027/index.html.

Now that the new CU act has been passed and a bailout fund has been established you will see the Newbridge situatuon resolved before the next 6 month period is complete.

Concerned Member

Well, i'll have to disagree with you that the board of directors were powerless. If, as they and their accounts staff felt that there was an injustice in the fact that their account were in order and that they were solvent, then this would have been the perfect evidence to appeal the decision. So it is quite evident that because of them not appealing, we can say with certainty that there is serious trouble with the accounts of Newbridge Credit Union.

Based on another contributor on this forum, when he asked questions of the board at a public meeting, they were unable to answer the questions and used the phrase; "we are unable to answer that question based on the secrecy clause" implemented on them through the special manager appointment. How convenient!!! This secrecy covers a lot of very serious questions that the members are entitled to.

Under the protection of this "special manager" which as you said is in effect an examinership, it gives the CU time to re-adjust their accounts. They got burnt with the bonds they had at Anglo and how many of their loans are performing, which in their accounts they class as assets. By the way, they use the gross amount, but as i said, how many are really being paid in full and how many will get protection under the new insolvency legislation. Who is also getting the debt write-downs they allocate for at the moment. Are there any ordinary members getting debt write-downs or are the board of directors or other special interests getting these.

And no dividend has been paid for the last 2 years. This is to cover the fact that there is no money or profits to pay them from as they are re-adjusting their accounts conveniently!!! If i had money in this institution, i would have bailed a long time ago.

RainyDay

Fulton Crown wrote: »

For example take a large shopping centre ...you could conceivably have three well run and profitable bookshops run by the same company in operation....but it wouldn't make sense would it ?

Just common economic sense pilgrim.....ummm ?

So the three Starbucks outlets in the large Dundrum Town Centre don't make any economic sense then?

Anyone

badgerbroc11 wrote: »

The Board could do very little to avoid the 'Special Manager' being appointed. The special manager is effectively a court appointed Receiver/liquidator by a more palatable name.

The Central Bank and Credit Institutions (Resolution) Act 2011 allows the regulator appoint such persons. The definition 'Special Manager' was a stroke if genius by whomever was responsible for drafting the legislation, if the definition receiver had been used and the headlines read 'Receiver appointed' then I think you would see people voting with their feet and pulling their savings out.
http://www.irishstatutebook.ie/2011/en/act/pub/0027/index.html.

Now that the new CU act has been passed and a bailout fund has been established you will see the Newbridge situatuon resolved before the next 6 month period is complete.

Its not a bailout fund, its money to be used to "faciliate" amalgamations. Its interesting though, that money has gone from 1billion, to 500m and now its 250m.

Black Swan

Concerned Member wrote: »

WHY DID THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS NOT APPEAL THE DECISION TO APPOINT THE "SPECIAL MANAGER"?

WERE THEY CONVENIENTLY COVERING THEMSELVES FROM POTENTIAL FUTURE QUESTIONS FROM IT'S MEMBERS?

WERE THEY COVERING UP ANY OTHER QUESTIONABLE PREFERENTIAL AND EXCESSIVE LOANS?

JUST QUESTIONS, BUT IT DOES SUGGEST FROM OTHER COMMENTS ON THE FORUM, THAT SOMETHING STRANGE IS GOING ON HERE.

MOD COMMENT:
Please don't make entire posts in caps. It's unnecessary, and appears to be SHOUTING on our forum.

badgerbroc11

Anyone wrote: »

Its not a bailout fund, its money to be used to "faciliate" amalgamations. Its interesting though, that money has gone from 1billion, to 500m and now its 250m.

Part 3 of the new act deals with Restructuring (amalgamations), Part 4 of the act deals with Stabilisation (bailout). You are correct however, in reality it won't be a bailout - Credit Unions, because of their strength are going to reimburse the fund. Which leads onto the question of the necessity of the ILCU SPS fund into the future.

badgerbroc11

Concerned Member wrote: »

Well, i'll have to disagree with you that the board of directors were powerless. If, as they and their accounts staff felt that there was an injustice in the fact that their account were in order and that they were solvent, then this would have been the perfect evidence to appeal the decision. So it is quite evident that because of them not appealing, we can say with certainty that there is serious trouble with the accounts of Newbridge Credit

@ Concerned Member
We do agree, I made the comment that the directors could do little about it as they had no defence. Their decisions over time at put the savings of the members at risk at the regulator had to step in and do his job. - You spelt it out much clearer than I.

Fulton Crown

RainyDay wrote: »

So the three Starbucks outlets in the large Dundrum Town Centre don't make any economic sense then?

Good point my friend...you have The Crown on the back foot ...however coffee shops is a little bit different from financial outlets.

May address your point more fully when I get my hand out of this turkeys innards. !

whitleydonal

it is interesting that the first time The bank resolution bill powers are used is against a credit union! Once the special manager is appointed the directors are not able to appeal because the special manager must approve funding for the directors to appeal unless they wish to pay out of their own pockets. I note with interest according to the latest spin from the Irish Independent Newspaper "the directors of Newbridge are in dispute with their special manager over his fees interesting spin when the fees are getting up to two million euros of the members money what was wrong? for two million will we ever find out? its a disgrace.

Damien360

whitleydonal wrote: »

it is interesting that the first time The bank resolution bill powers are used is against a credit union! Once the special manager is appointed the directors are not able to appeal because the special manager must approve funding for the directors to appeal unless they wish to pay out of their own pockets. I note with interest according to the latest spin from the Irish Independent Newspaper "the directors of Newbridge are in dispute with their special manager over his fees interesting spin when the fees are getting up to two million euros of the members money what was wrong? for two million will we ever find out? its a disgrace.

Who is paying for the high court visits to argue about fees ?

I am right in guessing that the directors are using CU money to fund the action and the special manager is billing the same CU for his barrister fees. Double whammy.

The special manager was brought in for a reason. We are still not told why but I would hazard a guess it was not done for the heck of it.

When we do finally get a AGM, the first motion needs to be the removal of all of the directors that brought about this mess. That did not happen to the banks because of political failure. In the CU, its members are free from political bull and are genuinely fuming.

Looking at cyprus , I begin to wonder would the government dare to do this to our smallest banks, the credit unions. No way I hear you say, but could you have guessed the outcome in Cyprus ? Long shot but worth considering all the same.

Concerned Member

So, let me get this straight. The directors would have had to get permission from the special manager to use funds to appeal the decision to appoint him in the first place yet is it being suggested that the directors are using credit union funds to argue his fees. Wouldn't they have to get approval from the special manager to use these funds for that purpose. Why didn't they request funds for the appeal? Is this all just propaganda now for the directors to look good in the face of an embarrassing episode? Is Luke near his exit? Are NCU positioning themselves for a false victory?

Is there any evidence my friends, that the directors even put in a request for funds to appeal the appointment of Luke Charleton. And if they did not, why not? And if they had the option of putting their hands in their pockets to fund an appeal on the grounds, as they claim in the background, that the NCU was fine, why didn't they? Surely they would have fought for the institution that they represent. Unless!!!!..... they allowed it to go ahead unchallenged for the simple reason that they needed protection under the cloak of secrecy to have their loans, their big loans, readjusted or some of them wrote down.

Would it surprise anyone that there was members on the Board of Directors that had Loans in excess of €200,000. These were the size of mortgages. And would it surprise anyone that some tried very hard to remove these loans from the books of the NCU around 2009 by going to other institutions to try and get mortgages to consolidate and replace these loans. Anyways, i wouldn't be surprised at all, and i would love someone from NCU to disprove this with evidence.:eek::eek:

whitleydonal

Under the bank resolution act you have limited time to appeal;this is a very rough piece of legislation that was never intended to be used oncredit unions.



As I understand it the Special manager has a barrister, thecentral bank has one and you are right the special must approve funds for theBoard to get barrister to represent them.





if this was any other process examinership, insolvencywinding up the process would be long over by now yet the court gives extensionafter extension racking up costs in excess of two million with no answers, noagm the whole process is a farce and the central bank is to blame they havefailed to manage this situation. This matter needs to be brought to aconclusion but don't expect any answers.

The members of newbridge credit union deserve answers after all they are paying for this nonsense

Concerned Member

Farcical is an understatement. What we all need to do is support the protesting and continue to fight for answers. There should also be legal accountability on behalf of the staff that deal with the accounts, the Auditors and the Board of Directors.

If a member is struggling with their loan repayments could they use legal precedence to forced the books open to see if other particular loans were offered special treatment in being offered debt forgiveness or debt restructuring, and have that retrospectively applied???