Anglo Tapes

Scofflaw

Mr.Micro wrote: »

Ah yes it did, but at what cost? We now see the likes of Bowe and Drumm and what their agenda was. Who is to say that the other banks were not doing the same. I will bet they were. The cost could have been a lot less if more facts were known perhaps, and crucially let Anglo go to the wall, and keep BOI and AIB. Someone made a decision to save bail the rotten Anglo, for reasons we may discover in due course? Golden circle and cronies come to mind. A bank guarantee yes, but not for all the banks.

Again, I simply don't see any need for this sort of "oh-ho, someone made the decision and it must have been a bent one". Not only don't I see why it's required, I think it's genuinely the least scary option as well as not at all substantiated.

Look at it this way. The Irish state had - and has had for several governments now - a policy of making Ireland a "financial centre". That means that banks were "valued customers" and the sort of business we wanted to attract. And we created the kind of regulatory environment that banks wanted, which applied - because it was a national regulatory environment - to both foreign and domestic banks. Successive governments did what the banks asked, not because the politicians were corrupt, but because like weak parents they were incapable of saying no, afraid that the banks wouldn't then love them. And the banks, like bad children, paid little or no attention to the government except when they wanted something.

Anglo wasn't a well-connected "golden circle" member, according to various analyses (see here, for example - scroll down slightly), it was a bank. They didn't even know who to get on to initially - that comes out in an interview with David Drumm back in 2009. They didn't have meetings with Cowen because he was an old chum and they were going straight to the top of the golden circle - they had meetings with him because they frankly didn't know what else to do, but were important enough to get a meeting.

People are wasting their time with this stuff - if it's true, it's still irrelevant except for lynch mob purposes. You don't dissuade crime by extravagant punishment - if you did, we'd have more crime than the Middle Ages rather than the other way round - you dissuade it by making it difficult to do in the first place, and very likely to be detected if it's done.

That sort of reform doesn't come out of a load of half-assed conjecture about what individual politicians might have known or wanted, or even out of finding out that one of them was bent - the regulatory failures that made all this possible, and allowed Anglo away with their strategy, were the result of publicly stated government policy over a decade in advance. The Regulator wasn't "a bent FF crony" who didn't do his job, his job was set out in statute and official policy as basically not interfering with the smooth running of the banks.

Serious case of standing in the middle of the forest trying to work out which individual flipping tree is to blame for us having got lost.

cordially,
if perhaps a little exasperated,
Scofflaw

Scofflaw

Mr.Micro wrote: »

Ah yes it did, but at what cost? We now see the likes of Bowe and Drumm and what their agenda was. Who is to say that the other banks were not doing the same. I will bet they were. The cost could have been a lot less if more facts were known perhaps, and crucially let Anglo go to the wall, and keep BOI and AIB. Someone made a decision to save bail the rotten Anglo, for reasons we may discover in due course? Golden circle and cronies come to mind. A bank guarantee yes, but not for all the banks.

As far as I can see, the reasons are given in one of the clips, where Bowe explains how they put the frighteners on the Central Bank team, telling them that:

"if we get into difficulties, we have 100,000 plus lump sum depositors in Ireland all of whom would be very vocal"

and

"take it that the other Irish banks will not be able to raise any wholesale funding for, for how long you want...Bank of Ireland, their balance sheet is €200 billion and 45% of that is wholesale, so, let's call that €90 billion, and let's say that 60% of that is rolling in the next 12 months, so that's €54 billion - take it that won't roll...ok?"

and

"you can also do a similar sum for Allied and Irish Permanent."

Clip 1 from here: http://www.independent.ie/business/irish/tapes-that-reveal-what-really-led-to-national-collapse-29366839.html

They're saying this to the Central Bank, who thought, up to probably 24 hours before, that everything was fine. And the Central Bank, after they'd changed their underpants, caved in because they didn't know any better.

There is no remaining mystery here. Anglo were included in everything because they bullied and bluffed their way in, and nobody knew enough, or had time to find out enough, to call their bluff, that's all. They said they were systemic, they said the system would go down if they went down, and nobody could contradict them.

cordially,
Scofflaw

GCU Flexible Demeanour

Scofflaw wrote: »

<...> And we created the kind of regulatory environment that banks wanted, which applied - because it was a national regulatory environment - to both foreign and domestic banks. <...>

I don't think this catches it. The regulatory environment was European, as a banking licence issued in any EEA country allowed a bank to open branches anywhere in the EEA. The structures were domestic, yes. But the competent authority had to be able to do whatever was necessary to enforce those European rules.

Now, it could be (and probably is) that the Regulator simply didn't operate that framework effectively. But it was certainly mandated to do a certain job, which was not done.

Scofflaw wrote: »

<...> the regulatory failures that made all this possible, and allowed Anglo away with their strategy, were the result of publicly stated government policy over a decade in advance. The Regulator wasn't "a bent FF crony" who didn't do his job, his job was set out in statute and official policy as basically not interfering with the smooth running of the banks.<...>

I don't think this can be dismissed so easily. It's true that Government policy was compounding the problem, maybe even causing it. But the policy that was doing that was largely tax policy incentivising property investment.

Another factor in the mix was joining the Eurozone, and the consequent flood of cheap money. I'm not sure our policy towards euro changeover amounted to much more than making sure everyone knew it was worth about 80 pence. Certainly, I don't think many digested the message that participating in a single currency meant that we no longer had a national economy - we were simply a region of a European economy.

As many have said, what broke the Irish banks was something reasonably straightforward. An over-concentration on one form of lending and, within that, an over-concentration on lending to the same entities within that sector. That's something that, in the normal course, should have been subject to regulatory scrutiny.

The Central Bank has and had an unusually high amount of scope for independent action. For instance, its board members and Governor are essentially unsackable, once appointed. It is actually quite hard to account for why it was so ineffective in policing banks. There is an issue, still, that needs to be aired.

Sorry for the long post, and I don't mean any of that to sound too dogmatic. All I really want to say is a public inquiry is necessary, as there's a slate of issues that actually haven't been adequately investigated and explained.

GCU Flexible Demeanour

Scofflaw wrote: »

<...> They said they were systemic, they said the system would go down if they went down, and nobody could contradict them.<...>

Maybe that's how it was. I simply doubt it, though. What's systemic is the clearing banks; the taxpayer probably couldn't avoid taking some level of hit for AIB's huge losses, as the economy couldn't function without the payments systems, and they are owned by the clearing banks.

But Anglo and INBS weren't systemic, by any meaning of the word. Even if some portion of their losses would have hit the clearing banks (and I'm not saying they would), it would have been enough just to be prepared to cover that portion.

The Central Bank would be intimately aware of what a systemic bank is, and why it's systemic. I'm afraid it really does need a lot more scrutiny, even so many years later.

Scofflaw

GCU Flexible Demeanour wrote: »

I don't think this catches it. The regulatory environment was European, as a banking licence issued in any EEA country allowed a bank to open branches anywhere in the EEA. The structures were domestic, yes. But the competent authority had to be able to do whatever was necessary to enforce those European rules.

Now, it could be (and probably is) that the Regulator simply didn't operate that framework effectively. But it was certainly mandated to do a certain job, which was not done.I don't think this can be dismissed so easily. It's true that Government policy was compounding the problem, maybe even causing it. But the policy that was doing that was largely tax policy incentivising property investment.

To be fair, I'm probably being too dismissive of the problems with the Regulator in saying that he was doing the assigned job, because in statute, as you say, he had to do certain things, and either did not do those things or did not do them effectively. What I really mean is that the Regulator, again, wasn't corrupt or ill-intentioned, but suffered from regulatory capture on the one side, and a government policy stance of laissez-faire and light touch regulation on the other.

GCU Flexible Demeanour wrote: »

Another factor in the mix was joining the Eurozone, and the consequent flood of cheap money. I'm not sure our policy towards euro changeover amounted to much more than making sure everyone knew it was worth about 80 pence. Certainly, I don't think many digested the message that participating in a single currency meant that we no longer had a national economy - we were simply a region of a European economy.

As many have said, what broke the Irish banks was something reasonably straightforward. An over-concentration on one form of lending and, within that, an over-concentration on lending to the same entities within that sector. That's something that, in the normal course, should have been subject to regulatory scrutiny.

The Central Bank has and had an unusually high amount of scope for independent action. For instance, its board members and Governor are essentially unsackable, once appointed. It is actually quite hard to account for why it was so ineffective in policing banks. There is an issue, still, that needs to be aired.

Sorry for the long post, and I don't mean any of that to sound too dogmatic. All I really want to say is a public inquiry is necessary, as there's a slate of issues that actually haven't been adequately investigated and explained.

The Honohan Report covers pretty much that area, though - and the Regulator, as far as I recall.

Nevertheless, apart from the above elements, the key protection in any national system against the emergence of a banking crisis should be the central bank and regulatory function – the main focus of this Report. It is clear that a major failure in terms of bank regulation and the maintenance of financial stability failure occurred. Indeed the same can be said to a greater or lesser extent with respect to several other advanced economies. However, the task in this Report is to characterise the ways in which the failures occurred in the Irish context and to identify the underlying reasons. Three broad areas have been identified (dealt with more comprehensively in Chapters 3 to 7): (i) the design of and approach to micro-prudential aspects, especially the supervision of individual institutions; (ii) the approach to macro-prudential or overall financial stability policy; and (iii) the failure to undertake decisive and effective remedial measures.

Even covers your point about construction:

The Government‘s procyclical fiscal policy stance, budgetary measures aimed at boosting the construction sector, and a relaxed approach to the growing reliance on construction-related and other insecure sources of tax revenue were significant factors contributing to the unsustainable structure of spending in the Irish economy.

cordially,
Scofflaw

Scofflaw

GCU Flexible Demeanour wrote: »

Maybe that's how it was. I simply doubt it, though. What's systemic is the clearing banks; the taxpayer probably couldn't avoid taking some level of hit for AIB's huge losses, as the economy couldn't function without the payments systems, and they are owned by the clearing banks.

But Anglo and INBS weren't systemic, by any meaning of the word. Even if some portion of their losses would have hit the clearing banks (and I'm not saying they would), it would have been enough just to be prepared to cover that portion.

The Central Bank would be intimately aware of what a systemic bank is, and why it's systemic. I'm afraid it really does need a lot more scrutiny, even so many years later.

So, when the Anglo guy says that he said that to the Central Bank, and Neary said (in parody) "look lads, if you're going for this now make sure whatever you get sorts it out, yeah?", that didn't happen? When Anglo's John Bowe thought they'd got the deal after what he said to them, something else really happened? It wasn't that the Financial Regulator and Central Bank, found to be clueless after an in-depth report, were actually clueless, as Anglo thought they were and as they appear to be on the Anglo tapes?

So we should set aside what there is evidence for - lots of evidence for - and go with a conspiracy theory for which there isn't any evidence, even in these tapes...because, as far as I can see, people have difficulty at heart in believing that the people involved were genuinely clueless.

For a variety of reasons, after nearly two decades in business, I have absolutely no difficulty with the idea that people were genuinely clueless. I really don't see any reason to invent conspiracies where things are adequately explained by incompetence.

cordially,
Scofflaw

GCU Flexible Demeanour

Scofflaw wrote: »

<...>What I really mean is that the Regulator, again, wasn't corrupt or ill-intentioned, but suffered from regulatory capture on the one side, and a government policy stance of laissez-faire and light touch regulation on the other.<...>

I'd agree with that.

Scofflaw wrote: »

<...>The Honohan Report covers pretty much that area, though - and the Regulator, as far as I recall.



Even covers your point about construction:

Indeed, it's a while since I read it. I flicked it open now, and found the bit where the IMF said in 2006

Financial institution profitability and capitalisation are currently very strong, with Irish banking sector profits amongst the highest in western Europe. Reflecting their good performance, the major Irish banks receive upper medium to high-grade ratings from the international ratings agencies.<....>

The main recommendations of the [IMF] FSAP team (Box 6.2) focused on upgrading staff numbers and skills [in the Financial Regulator], with the stress-testing exercise selected for special mention. However, allaying any possible concerns on this score, the team remarked reassuringly that reflecting the general robustness of the financial system and the supervisory framework, these recommendations are primarily for further enhancements rather than reflecting a need to address fundamental weaknesses.

So, yes, there is some good material out there already. Yet, I feel, there's still a need to dig into it. These tapes do illuminate the matter in a way that wasn't there before - although they seem to have been in the possession of the Garda investigation for some time. I think they highlight to people that there's likely other stuff out there that needs to be brought to light, and digested.

GCU Flexible Demeanour

Scofflaw wrote: »

So, when the Anglo guy says that he said that to the Central Bank, and Neary said (in parody) "look lads, if you're going for this now make sure whatever you get sorts it out, yeah?", that didn't happen? When Anglo's John Bowe thought they'd got the deal after what he said to them, something else really happened? It wasn't that the Financial Regulator and Central Bank, found to be clueless after an in-depth report, were actually clueless, as Anglo thought they were and as they appear to be on the Anglo tapes?

The situation might be exactly as you'd expect it to be. That's certainly plausible. I'd suggest we do have to be mindful that those snippets about the meetings with the Regulator are just what we're hearing from an Anglo manager. Conceivably, the Regulator people would describe it differently.

What I found significant in the snippets is the bit where an unnamed Regulator official is reported as asking in Anglo had any decent assets. Subject to the caveat I've given, and just taking it as a statement made, that would make me wonder if, in fact, the Regulator did have substantial worries about Anglo being a black hole.

But, again, I don't want to seem dogmatic, because all I really think is this material does highlight the extent to which the narrative of what happened isn't really complete yet.

Scofflaw

GCU Flexible Demeanour wrote: »

The situation might be exactly as you'd expect it to be. That's certainly plausible. I'd suggest we do have to be mindful that those snippets about the meetings with the Regulator are just what we're hearing from an Anglo manager. Conceivably, the Regulator people would describe it differently.

I don't doubt they would....! I appreciate that Bowe is deriving humour value from creating a parody of cluelessness there, and I'm not working off the impression being created. I'm working off the fact that there's nothing apparently coming back at Anglo from the Regulator or Neary - nothing that Anglo needs to do beyond what they've already decided to do, no surprises, nothing thrown back in their faces. Had there been, it would have had to be mentioned, but there's nothing, which is what allows Bowe his parodies.

GCU Flexible Demeanour wrote: »

What I found significant in the snippets is the bit where an unnamed Regulator official is reported as asking in Anglo had any decent assets. Subject to the caveat I've given, and just taking it as a statement made, that would make me wonder if, in fact, the Regulator did have substantial worries about Anglo being a black hole.

But, again, I don't want to seem dogmatic, because all I really think is this material does highlight the extent to which the narrative of what happened isn't really complete yet.

Actually, that's Neary saying that - and I would again see it as evidence of cluelessness. Neary shouldn't have been reduced to asking the Anglo negotiating team whether Anglo had "any assets" they could put in play.

cordially,
Scofflaw

Scofflaw

Feargale, Busted_Flat, take the public/private trench warfare somewhere else.

moderately,
Scofflaw

ryanfm

Scofflaw wrote: »

I really don't see any reason to invent conspiracies where things are adequately explained by incompetence.

It always surprises me that more people don't understand this.

Scofflaw

ryanfm wrote: »

It always surprises me that more people don't understand this.

My best explanation of it is that a world where there are cunning conspiracies is preferable to one which is bumbling along from day to day. In both cases, those responsible for decision-making are armed with devastating weaponry, in charge of enormously complex systems, and with the capacity to wreck the world's climate and ecosystem through either action or inaction - but in one case they're cunning and coolly rational Machiavellian intellects, in the other they're a bunch of barely evolved social apes who have yet to adapt fully to the change from hitting each other with sticks on the African savannah.

Plus, I think we think of the adult world as being adult, with all that implies in terms of how it should operate, even though we recognise that we individually aren't what we thought adults were like when we were kids. Or perhaps not all us realise that we're not, which is worse.

cordially,
Scofflaw

Mr.Micro

Scofflaw wrote: »

Again, I simply don't see any need for this sort of "oh-ho, someone made the decision and it must have been a bent one". Not only don't I see why it's required, I think it's genuinely the least scary option as well as not at all substantiated.

Look at it this way. The Irish state had - and has had for several governments now - a policy of making Ireland a "financial centre". That means that banks were "valued customers" and the sort of business we wanted to attract. And we created the kind of regulatory environment that banks wanted, which applied - because it was a national regulatory environment - to both foreign and domestic banks. Successive governments did what the banks asked, not because the politicians were corrupt, but because like weak parents they were incapable of saying no, afraid that the banks wouldn't then love them. And the banks, like bad children, paid little or no attention to the government except when they wanted something.

Anglo wasn't a well-connected "golden circle" member, according to various analyses (see here, for example - scroll down slightly), it was a bank. They didn't even know who to get on to initially - that comes out in an interview with David Drumm back in 2009. They didn't have meetings with Cowen because he was an old chum and they were going straight to the top of the golden circle - they had meetings with him because they frankly didn't know what else to do, but were important enough to get a meeting.

People are wasting their time with this stuff - if it's true, it's still irrelevant except for lynch mob purposes. You don't dissuade crime by extravagant punishment - if you did, we'd have more crime than the Middle Ages rather than the other way round - you dissuade it by making it difficult to do in the first place, and very likely to be detected if it's done.

That sort of reform doesn't come out of a load of half-assed conjecture about what individual politicians might have known or wanted, or even out of finding out that one of them was bent - the regulatory failures that made all this possible, and allowed Anglo away with their strategy, were the result of publicly stated government policy over a decade in advance. The Regulator wasn't "a bent FF crony" who didn't do his job, his job was set out in statute and official policy as basically not interfering with the smooth running of the banks.

Serious case of standing in the middle of the forest trying to work out which individual flipping tree is to blame for us having got lost.

cordially,
if perhaps a little exasperated,
Scofflaw

Whilst I agree that incompetence played a huge part in the banking disaster, be it the Regulator, the Central bank, the banks themselves, I do not think that is the only reason. Incompetence is often covered up by manipulations and schemes that are premeditated and devious. It is too dismissive to perhaps suggest, that it was all down to incompetence. An investigation is needed regardless, and you may well be correct in your analysis that there is no mystery at all.

The Central bank should have known that Anglo was not systemic of course, but as the former was not up to speed at all at the time, then it would have panicked at the scenario painted by the Anglo lot. I hope that we can get the matter clarified in time, not that it will make any difference to us all now as it is done and dusted.

Scofflaw

Mr.Micro wrote: »

Whilst I agree that incompetence played a huge part in the banking disaster, be it the Regulator, the Central bank, the banks themselves, I do not think that is the only reason. Incompetence is often covered up by manipulations and schemes that are premeditated and devious. It is too dismissive to perhaps suggest, that it was all down to incompetence. An investigation is needed regardless, and you may well be correct in your analysis that there is no mystery at all.

The Central bank should have known that Anglo was not systemic of course, but as the former was not up to speed at all at the time, then it would have panicked at the scenario painted by the Anglo lot. I hope that we can get the matter clarified in time, not that it will make any difference to us all now as it is done and dusted.

Regrettably that's the case, I think. Coming back, though, to Sand's point about proving negatives, there's never going to be such a thing as conclusive proof people like Cowen weren't involved - you can't actually prove that, ever. All you can show is that you have an explanation that doesn't require his involvement - which I think we have - and no evidence of involvement, which I think we also have.

We have, on the one hand, Honohan's report, which describes a culture of cluelessness and inertia at the Regulator. Excuse me quoting at length here:

At no point throughout the period did the CBFSAI staff believe that any of the institutions were facing serious underlying difficulties, let alone potential insolvency problems – even at a late stage as the crisis neared. Explaining this is not easy considering that all the staff involved were specialists, working diligently on what was understood to be an important task. Thus, the failure was clearly of a systemic nature rather than related to any one individual. A variety of factors were at work.

First, the style of supervision adopted did not generate the most relevant or useful information to anything near the extent required. By relying excessively on a regulatory philosophy emphasising process over outcomes, supervisory practice focussed on verifying governance and risk management models rather than attempting an independent assessment of risk, whether on a line-by-line or whole-of-institution basis. This approach involved a degree of complacency about the likely performance of well-governed banks that proved unwarranted. It was not just a question of emphasising principles over rules, it was the degree of trust that well-governed banks could be relied upon to remain safe and sound.

By not challenging in detail such aspects as the security underlying large developer loans (including the extent to which development projects were co-financed by the developers‘ own funds) regulators did not realise just how vulnerable the lenders were to property price declines. More generally, in their reliance on assessments of systems, structures and models, they downplayed quantification of risks. Even when confronted with evidence that the banks themselves had insufficient information, the regulators failed to grasp the scale of the potential exposure.

Broadening the scope and intensifying supervision, especially its quantitative aspects, which could have addressed the above problems, would have required considerable additional staff resources and training to help offset the asymmetry in skills vis-avis the regulated institutions. It was already difficult to staff-up to intended levels given the high salaries and plentiful job opportunities available at the time in the private financial sector. Only a small number of staff within the FR were directly involved in prudential supervision of credit institutions – no more than two per major firm.

Second, even if armed with the necessary information, to be effective there would have had to be a greater degree of intrusiveness and assertiveness on the part of regulators in challenging the banks. Although management of the FR would not accept that their ―principles-based‖ approach ever implied ―light touch‖ regulation, the approach was characterised as being user-friendly in presentations aimed at expanding the exportoriented financial services sector. There are other indications of an unduly deferential approach to the banking industry which may have contributed to a reluctance to secondguess bankers in any aggressive manner. Together, these might have partly constituted what is described in the literature as ―regulatory capture‖.5 Thus, it would have been known within the FR that intrusive demands from line staff could be and were set aside after direct representations were made to senior regulators. Also, attempts to formalise some of the principles (through Director‘ Compliance Statements and a Corporate Governance Code) both came to naught following industry lobbying (and, for the first of these, in the face of concerns expressed by the Department of Finance).

Consistent with this regulatory climate, there was a pattern of inconclusive engagement on the part of supervisors with regulated entities and lack of decisive follow-through. In one key case, where the Financial Regulator had identified serious weaknesses requiring corrective action, despite a protracted correspondence extending over many years, the problems had still not been solved prior to the crisis. By not adhering to time-bound deadlines for escalation, the FR allowed some important matters to drift. At the same time the appetite for legal challenge was limited which meant that in practice entities were given the benefit of the doubt; no penalties for breach of prudential regulations were ever imposed on a bank before 2008. If unsuccessful, test legal cases could have helped garner support for additional legislative powers.

That's a damning judgement - it says they didn't know what was going on, didn't have the resources to know what was going on, didn't really want to know what was going on, and didn't do anything about it even where they did know what was going on. Regulators had turned the job of regulation into one of checking that the banks had the "right systems" internally, and once they found that to be the case, the job was done.

Suddenly, what the civil servants thought was a solid bank, and had thought was a solid bank for a decade, turned round and told them they needed intervention because they were up the creek, and panicked them into intervening. Cluelessness met low cunning, and low cunning triumphed - there's no need for any special intervention or political stroke-pulling that I can see.

cordially,
Scofflaw

listermint

Scofflaw, you appear to be banding this clueless and incomptence wagon around since the tapes came out.


Being clueless and incompetent does not purge you of responsibility in relation to the largest defrauding of state assets since we came into existence. The fact is people need to be held responsible. Conspiracy theories aside. The men involved in these tapes (despite their candor of stupidity) had reprehensible actions. These are adults not children so actions were thought out and methodical. The full weight of any and all laws at our disposal need to be brought to bare. Additionally the entire dealings since they began in Anglo should also be brought to the light because its quite obvious this is the tip of their personal iceberg.

Scofflaw

listermint wrote: »

Scofflaw, you appear to be banding this clueless and incomptence wagon around since the tapes came out.


Being clueless and incompetent does not purge you of responsibility in relation to the largest defrauding of state assets since we came into existence. The fact is people need to be held responsible. Conspiracy theories aside. The men involved in these tapes (despite their candor of stupidity) had reprehensible actions. These are adults not children so actions were thought out and methodical. The full weight of any and all laws at our disposal need to be brought to bare. Additionally the entire dealings since they began in Anglo should also be brought to the light because its quite obvious this is the tip of their personal iceberg.

I have no idea why people think I would see cluelessness as a good thing, or why they think the opposite of 'conspirator' is 'innocent'. On the contrary, I regard these people as doubly guilty - they both committed damaging actions, and did so out of wilful and culpable negligence. Each by itself is worth penalising.

regards,
Scofflaw

drunkmonkey

I find this the biggest mystery about the Anglo tapes.

Has a journalist or someone in the Independent been sitting on these tapes to look after vested interests?

Has a politician or party been waiting until the dust settled to use them for political gain?

Who currently has the tapes from all the other banks, is there anybody going to listen to them?

Sierra Oscar

The Gardai seized the tapes four years ago. How exactly they got to the Independent is unknown.

Mr.Micro

Scofflaw wrote: »

Regrettably that's the case, I think. Coming back, though, to Sand's point about proving negatives, there's never going to be such a thing as conclusive proof people like Cowen weren't involved - you can't actually prove that, ever. All you can show is that you have an explanation that doesn't require his involvement - which I think we have - and no evidence of involvement, which I think we also have.

We have, on the one hand, Honohan's report, which describes a culture of cluelessness and inertia at the Regulator. Excuse me quoting at length here:



That's a damning judgement - it says they didn't know what was going on, didn't have the resources to know what was going on, didn't really want to know what was going on, and didn't do anything about it even where they did know what was going on. Regulators had turned the job of regulation into one of checking that the banks had the "right systems" internally, and once they found that to be the case, the job was done.

Suddenly, what the civil servants thought was a solid bank, and had thought was a solid bank for a decade, turned round and told them they needed intervention because they were up the creek, and panicked them into intervening. Cluelessness met low cunning, and low cunning triumphed - there's no need for any special intervention or political stroke-pulling that I can see.

cordially,
Scofflaw

So do you think that an inquiry is not necessary then?

Mr.Micro

listermint wrote: »

Scofflaw, you appear to be banding this clueless and incomptence wagon around since the tapes came out.


Being clueless and incompetent does not purge you of responsibility in relation to the largest defrauding of state assets since we came into existence. The fact is people need to be held responsible. Conspiracy theories aside. The men involved in these tapes (despite their candor of stupidity) had reprehensible actions. These are adults not children so actions were thought out and methodical. The full weight of any and all laws at our disposal need to be brought to bare. Additionally the entire dealings since they began in Anglo should also be brought to the light because its quite obvious this is the tip of their personal iceberg.

Even if it was all incompetence, then if possible it should be brought out into the light where it happened.....the Central bank, department of finance, the regulator, all the banks and whomever. It was public money that paid for this after all. It is shocking that nearly 5 years have gone by and only now is there talk of an inquiry, albeit the last lot were not keen.

drunkmonkey

Sierra Oscar wrote: »

The Gardai seized the tapes four years ago. How exactly they got to the Independent is unknown.

So the Gardai potentially knew what was on those tapes all along?

Sierra Oscar

drunkmonkey wrote: »

So the Gardai potentially knew what was on those tapes all along?

Of course they did, I would imagine officials in the Department of Finance listened to them too. It would be very concerning if they didn't.

I wouldn't necessarily blame the Gardai here. It seems someone leaked these tapes because they knew the investigation was going nowhere, and that it was in the public interest to release the contents of the tapes.

Worztron

drunkmonkey wrote: »

So the Gardai potentially knew what was on those tapes all along?

Yes but the Gardaí are too busy protecting sHELL by beating protesters to bother jailing the while collars that bankrupted the country. Rotten old Ireland.

Scofflaw

Mr.Micro wrote: »

So do you think that an inquiry is not necessary then?

I don't mind an inquiry if it takes us closer to reform. If it's a set of show trials, it's a waste of time.

cordially,
Scofflaw

Scofflaw

Sierra Oscar wrote: »

Of course they did, I would imagine officials in the Department of Finance listened to them too. It would be very concerning if they didn't.

I wouldn't necessarily blame the Gardai here. It seems someone leaked these tapes because they knew the investigation was going nowhere, and that it was in the public interest to release the contents of the tapes.

As far as I know, that's actually just speculation.

cordially,
Scofflaw

Sierra Oscar

Scofflaw wrote: »

As far as I know, that's actually just speculation.

cordially,
Scofflaw

Enda confirmed that the Gardai had the tapes for four years in a statement he made in the Dáil yesterday. You can draw your own conclusions from there, especially when you keep in mind that Pual Williams is leading the story for the Independent.

Sierra Oscar

Sierra Oscar wrote: »

Enda confirmed that the Gardai had the tapes for four years in a statement he made in the Dáil yesterday. You can draw your own conclusions from there, especially when you keep in mind that Paul Williams is leading the story for the Independent.

The possibilities are that:

Garda Management, at the highest levels, is in cahoots with the bankers/politicians.

Gardai investigating this are incompetent and or corrupt.

jmayo

Scofflaw wrote: »

And as long as that's what everybody accepts it as being, that's fine. But people "knew" what was happening, or said they did, even if most of what they said turned out to be complete rubbish. Speculation was not in any way limited to people just speculating whether the IMF were coming in - you remember that because it was correct, but you're leaving out the rest of the speculation, much of which was absurd panicky drivel.

But from my recollection, you lambasted anyone for even mooting the idea they were coming as mere speculation.

Scofflaw wrote: »

We've always been cynical - famous for it - and we have that history, so no. Our cynicism is largely just another face for our hypocrisy, and we mostly use it to tell ourselves "sure, if I/they didn't do it, someone else would"

Is that not also apathy ?

Scofflaw wrote: »

and "sure, they're all at it, why should I worry about it" to justify our own peccadilloes. What would make a difference is if we were honest and responsible, rather than knowing the price of everything and the value of nothing.

I do agree we as a race, or rather a nation, do seem to admire the cute hoors.
I continously maintain it is another throwback to our years of being a colony.
Much like our inherent desire for property ownership, our abhorrence of evictions and dispossessions, we have a huge chunk of our population who seem to think that it is ok to get one over "the system" or our rulers.
Hence the cute hoors are tolerated, even promoted and lauded as someone to be admired.
We elect them as our rulers because they believe in shades of grey like many of ourselves.
We do not have a notion of civic responsibility.

Scofflaw wrote: »

The Anglo boys on the tapes beat your cynicism hollow, and I'm not celebrating it. I don't think you are, either.

regards,
Scofflaw

Sadly their cyncism went in equal measure with greed and arrogance.
Mine goes in equal measure with rage and apathy at this stage.
And I think you know by now where I place such people as those on the Anglo tapes.

shedweller wrote: »

In fairness, i have to agree. Our apathy has gotten us into this mess. Now, where to go from here. What do we do that isn't apathetic? What WILL change how all this nonsense works in the future?

I wish I knew.
I had hoped that fianna fail would have been consigned to history and that the other parties would have wised up.
Instead we still have cr** like o'reilly placing services in his own backyard.
We need new people in politics and we need a massive shake up.
Maybe if we had gone completly bust it would have led to such a revolution.

I had hope for some of the new entrants like Ross, Donnelly, even Wallace and Ming.
But what did we get ?
We got Donnelly pushing for bailouts for mortgage defaulters.
Did anyone notice how all these new independents acted when wallace was found to be a tax cheat or when Ming was found out to have been getting penalty points squashed ?
It was just same old same old mullarkey.

A lot of the population are very unhappy with the current system, but as with the mention of protests it becomes apparent that we are very divided.

jmayo

Vladimir Kurtains wrote: »

The guards may not have been the source of the tapes. They may also have been obtained by discovery.

Oh FFS.
Have people never noticed where paul williams always gets his information ?
If the Gardaí want something in the media paul is their man.

Scofflaw wrote: »

It's neither plausible nor necessary. It invents a conspiracy which is not needed to explain what happened, when what happened is perfectly well explained by nobody outside Anglo knowing how bad things were in Anglo.

If people thought things were ok in Anglo then why did NTMA refuse to buy in ?
You do know that conspiracy theories actually sometimes have a basis in the truth.

Scofflaw wrote: »

Even the stuff you've cited shows a clueless Cowen still doing favours for the bank as the bank crumbles internally. Is that what you're trying to explain? If he knew, why wouldn't he distance himself?

cordially,
Scofflaw

How could cowen distance himself from the money men behind fianna fail.
If Anglo went then all those developers who had been visiting the fianna fail tents and going to fund raising dinners would have gone.

Look at the Anglo ten and then look how many were fianna fail supporters.
Four of the Anglo ten (jerry conlan, seamus ross, gerry gannon, joe o’reilly) were staunch ff supporters.

Then add some other ff supports like bernard mcnamara, sean dunne, johnny ronan who had massive borrowings with Anglo.

Maybe I am a total cynic but having watched fianna fail for the last 30 something years I wouldn't trust them to tell me night from day.
And sometimes I wonder if you are totally naive ?

drunkmonkey

Will all this have a knock on effect on the promissory notes or have we lost all the money given and about to be given? Not one bondholder should haven been saved in Anglo, you bets your money and you takes your chances.