Anglo Tapes

View

drunkmonkey wrote: »

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.

You do realise that the bond holders probably include pension funds here in Ireland? Maybe even yours or your parents?

Dannyboy83

Scofflaw wrote: »

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.

Just to be clear, I'm not continuing with the development of the Plausible Deniability Theory, but I would like you to clarify why you are driving the point so hard in several posts, that an MoF's or PM's awareness is irrelevant.
I think I must be misinterpreting what you're saying somehow, but you are pushing very hard, that such knowledge is irrelevant, only except for 'mean glee', 'venting spleen' i.e. personal vendettas

Are you saying it's irrelevant because we don't have the legislation to prosecute?
I would imagine in such a hypothetical situation, the MoF or PM would be guilty of fraud, and could potentially have to serve a sentence.

But more importantly, 'Sarbanes Oxley' or 'Ethics in Government 78' among other legislation were created to deter fraud/crime, after the offences were perpetrated. Which is quite typical of Irish politics (if not politics in general), in that we have to wait until a situation occurs before we can understand how to legislate for it.

drunkmonkey

View wrote: »

You do realise that the bond holders probably include pension funds here in Ireland? Maybe even yours or your parents?

No dads's pension got shafted in the mess, I've no problem with people who made bad gambling mistakes loosing their money. Happens me in poker it can happen them with anglo.

View

drunkmonkey wrote: »

No dads's pension got shafted in the mess, I've no problem with people who made bad gambling mistakes loosing their money. Happens me in poker it can happen them with anglo.

Fair enough, at least you accept that.

Problem is though most people don't regard saving for their pension as "gambling" and would be furious at the idea.

And although it would be almost impossible to determine in advance having pension funds going broke as well as the banks would probably cause unimaginable chaos.

Sierra Oscar

Paul Williams was hinting strongly on Newstalk just now that one of the recordings will connect a senior civil servant to the bank.

listermint

View wrote: »

You do realise that the bond holders probably include pension funds here in Ireland? Maybe even yours or your parents?

Most average workers pension schemes were decimated in this mess, whats your point ?

The NTMA stopped dealing in Anglo in 2006 so im sure other pension funds knew about it. I think that the whole pension thing is overstated by vested interests.

Cody Pomeray

View wrote: »

You do realise that the bond holders probably include pension funds here in Ireland? Maybe even yours or your parents?

Oh God, trite scare tactic #101.
The Pension funds situation is addressed by implementing regulatory change automatically disbarring pension funds from holding any securities that are not eligible as ECB collateral or, in an emergency restructuring, by non-inclusion of held to maturity debt, which is a deal that ordinarily suits pensions and trusts over other funds (like banks themselves). Other options include buybacks, or even straightforward statutory intervention by the legislature to protect the most vulnerable pensioners, just like depositors.

This emotive mantra of "what about Mammy's pension" should be met with a good deal of scepticism and eye rolling, by now.

View

listermint wrote: »

Most average workers pension schemes were decimated in this mess, whats your point ?.

There is a difference between decimated and reduced to nothing. The politicians and people are even less likely to be happy with the "you get nothing" option.

listermint wrote: »

The NTMA stopped dealing in Anglo in 2006 so im sure other pension funds knew about it. I think that the whole pension thing is overstated by vested interests.

The NTMA is one out of a long list. Most people have a vested interest in their pension fund, so the "vested interests" are likely to be larger than you might expect.

View

Cody Pomeray wrote: »

Oh God, trite scare tactic #101.
The Pension funds situation is addressed by implementing regulatory change automatically disbarring pension funds from holding any securities that are not eligible as ECB collateral or, in an emergency restructuring, by non-inclusion of held to maturity debt, which is a deal that ordinarily suits pensions and trusts over other funds (like banks themselves). Other options include buybacks, or even straightforward statutory intervention by the legislature to protect the most vulnerable pensioners, just like depositors.

That's a possible future course of action. But not particularly relevant to a decision made in the past under the system at the time.

Morrisseeee

View wrote: »

Problem is though most people don't regard saving for their pension as "gambling" and would be furious at the idea.

But....but.....investing in a pension is a gamble, a total gamble, there's no guaranteed profit option in my pension investment options guide !!

And then the Gov comes in and takes out money from my (gambled) nest-egg, but I can't get near it until I retire !!

[Jackass]

I have a feeling that these tapes are going to be blown up, and I think the conversation will come to light that was held with Taoiseach Brian Cowen on the Golf Course.

They've already talked about what mugs they made out of the regulator, they've already clearly demonstrated both the preplanned and subsequent deceiving of the regulator, they have demonstrated their awareness of the scale and the repercussions of their actions (singing the German national anthem, they were aware of the possibility that their deceitful actions could result in the country needing international assistance, if not bankrupting the country entirely), if they can now reveal that they lied to the then Taoiseach in order to have him sign off on the bank guarantee, I think bingo, the boys can be charged with fraud.

I also think they will vigorously fight extradition charges from the United States on the grounds that they can't get a fair trial in Ireland because of the publicity and negative public sentiment towards them, and will probably still get away with it.

That's why I'm a bit uncomfortable with the tapes being in the public domain at this point, and why I think this should all be going on behind the scenes with the DPP. These tapes have presumably been in the hands of the Garda fraud squad for over 4 years now, why has nothing happened yet??

View

Morrisseeee wrote: »

But....but.....investing in a pension is a gamble, a total gamble, there's no guaranteed profit option in my pension investment options guide !!

And then the Gov comes in and takes out money from my (gambled) nest-egg, but I can't get near it until I retire !!

Well, the same applies to housing. How many voters are happy with negative equity?

Would we want the equivalent of it to apply to the pensions industry as well?

One disaster at a time is, I suspect, the political and popular preference.

Scofflaw

Dannyboy83 wrote: »

Just to be clear, I'm not continuing with the development of the Plausible Deniability Theory, but I would like you to clarify why you are driving the point so hard in several posts, that an MoF's or PM's awareness is irrelevant.
I think I must be misinterpreting what you're saying somehow, but you are pushing very hard, that such knowledge is irrelevant, only except for 'mean glee', 'venting spleen' i.e. personal vendettas

Are you saying it's irrelevant because we don't have the legislation to prosecute?
I would imagine in such a hypothetical situation, the MoF or PM would be guilty of fraud, and could potentially have to serve a sentence.

I may of course have got a little carried away...no, it's obviously not something that can be ignored in itself, and if it were a systemic issue then I would consider it as very serious indeed. That is, if the banks were somehow going around their Regulator to let the Taoiseach know their real position on a regular basis, and the Taoiseach was then arranging things in favour of the banks while keeping their Regulator in the dark, that would obviously be a huge issue.

In this case, though, that's not what's being claimed. I'm not even sure exactly what's being claimed, other than "Cowen knew" (knew what?) and that because (?) of whatever he knew he then "corruptly" (?) included Anglo in the blanket guarantee. Unfortunately, that doesn't make a blind bit of sense to me. The "corruptly" seems to be in there because otherwise it's more sensible to say that if Cowen did know that Anglo was completely screwed, he would have done his best to avoid the utter political disaster of including them in the guarantee, because they would have a very good chance of bringing the whole house of cards down around everybody's ears.

I can't see why on earth Anglo would tell Cowen they were completely screwed, because, again, any rational calculus says that the use he's most likely to make of that information is to exclude them from the guarantee. I would say, on the contrary, that if Anglo told Cowen anything, they told him what they're known to have told Kenny and Bruton at the time - that they were, in fact, the least screwed of the Irish banks, that their loan book was solid, that if he gave them a helping hand they'd be fine, if he didn't then the other banks would go under in their wake.

That's basically why I think the whole "Cowen knew something and did something" angle is a red herring - it either makes no logical sense, or is just a bad decision on foot of a lobbying campaign by Anglo in which they told Cowen exactly what they were telling everyone else. I don't see anything wrong with them talking to him, given the situation, and while he may on foot of that have made a bad decision, he was, after all, the Taoiseach, and it was his job to make decisions, so I don't see anything wrong with him making a decision either.

Now, setting aside my concerns over a complete lack of evidence for a moment, if Cowen did know Anglo was completely screwed, having been told so by Anglo privily, and included them in the guarantee corruptly on foot of promises to him personally from the bank, sure, that puts him on the hook fairly uniquely for €30bn of taxpayer's money flushed down the Anglo toilet. But there isn't any evidence for it at all, and there's no need for any such theory to account for Anglo's inclusion in the guarantee, so as far as I can see it's a completely pointless red herring.

That's why I say it's being pursued out of a wish to hunt Cowen, because it's not needed as an explanation. Maybe in some cases, it's not a personal thing, but a wish to see the politicians of that time as implicated in a corrupt way, but the effect is pretty much the same. What people seem to me to be looking for there is someone to blame, in a particular way, unreservedly, all bad and no reservations about how they were trying their best or whatever.

And that makes people think that when I say "no, they were probably trying to do their best, but were honestly incompetent and suffering from the handicap of a decade of their own policy of negligence" I'm somehow excusing them, because I'm not getting on the 100% condemnation bandwagon. That's not correct, though - I'd be happy to see them imprisoned (since we've given up the death penalty) on that basis. I don't need them to be villains - for me, it's quite sufficient that they were self-satisfied and self-deluding idiots, because they were in positions of responsibility. Nor is spreading the responsibility a way of excusing anyone - on the contrary, focusing on one or two individual politicians excuses a rather large number of senior civil servants who are, from my perspective, equally if not more deserving of prison time.

Dannyboy83 wrote: »

But more importantly, 'Sarbanes Oxley' or 'Ethics in Government 78' among other legislation were created to deter fraud/crime, after the offences were perpetrated. Which is quite typical of Irish politics (if not politics in general), in that we have to wait until a situation occurs before we can understand how to legislate for it.

The problem with prospective legislation is that it's far more likely not to work, not to do what's necessary, because it has to be based on expectations and projections as to what will be necessary - plus, persuading people of the necessity of something in advance is a lot harder.

cordially,
Scofflaw

FreudianSlippers

At least we can count on the consistency of this government to pass the buck, engage in political point scoring and attempt another power grab. They certainly want the Dáil to be all powerful, judge, jury and pardoner. FF's recommendation of a tribunal has all what FG/Lab propose with the benefit of holding people to account. What's here to object to?!

Cody Pomeray

View wrote: »

That's a possible future course of action. But not particularly relevant to a decision made in the past under the system at the time.

Why not? Why not the accounting treatment I referred to, or the legislative protections?

SpaceTime

when are they releasing these tapes?


They might be better getting then out there soon before someone gets rid of them somehow!

Mr.Micro

SpaceTime wrote: »

when are they releasing these tapes?


They might be better getting then out there soon before someone gets rid of them somehow!

They are probably being selective anyway as to what is being released or will be released. Wait for the injunctions to stop further releases? Its almost like pantomime. Listening to the so called bankers and their banter, another word that rhymes with bankers comes to mind.

Scofflaw

drunkmonkey wrote: »

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.

That money has been lost ever since it was put in - there was never any chance of getting it back. To continue the gambling metaphor, the state backed a horse which was actually dead, but whose trainers had it propped up attractively against a wall.

Sure, that's horribly unfair, but that's life without due diligence - and to be fair to the bondholders, they at least put their money into a bank which was at the time still functional, unlike the State.

What it will quite possibly do, though, is have a knock-on effect on our hopes of getting ESM funding for the remaining banks. I think these tapes do a very good job of reminding the rest of Europe, and Germany in particular, of the "economic nationalism" of the blanket guarantee, and the way it tilted the playing field to drain everyone else's deposits into the Irish banks at a time when their banks were also suffering deposit leakage - and they do it at a sensitive time for the government's efforts to get the ESM to retrospectively fund the remaining Irish banks.

cordially,
Scofflaw

Scofflaw

[Jackass] wrote: »

I have a feeling that these tapes are going to be blown up, and I think the conversation will come to light that was held with Taoiseach Brian Cowen on the Golf Course.

They've already talked about what mugs they made out of the regulator, they've already clearly demonstrated both the preplanned and subsequent deceiving of the regulator, they have demonstrated their awareness of the scale and the repercussions of their actions (singing the German national anthem, they were aware of the possibility that their deceitful actions could result in the country needing international assistance, if not bankrupting the country entirely), if they can now reveal that they lied to the then Taoiseach in order to have him sign off on the bank guarantee, I think bingo, the boys can be charged with fraud.

I also think they will vigorously fight extradition charges from the United States on the grounds that they can't get a fair trial in Ireland because of the publicity and negative public sentiment towards them, and will probably still get away with it.

That's why I'm a bit uncomfortable with the tapes being in the public domain at this point, and why I think this should all be going on behind the scenes with the DPP. These tapes have presumably been in the hands of the Garda fraud squad for over 4 years now, why has nothing happened yet??

Because fraud investigations take a long time. Shatter actually offered them more people back in mid-2011, but they refused on the basis that it takes years for someone to become of use in a fraud investigation, and having a bunch of trainees around would slow things down rather than speed them up.

cordially,
Scofflaw

jmayo

listermint wrote: »

Most average workers pension schemes were decimated in this mess, whats your point ?

The NTMA stopped dealing in Anglo in 2006 so im sure other pension funds knew about it. I think that the whole pension thing is overstated by vested interests.

You would think that, but the irish bansk were the bluechips of the Irish stock market and investment managers would probably feel compelled to have Irish blue chip stock thus they would probably have the stock of the main banks.

Scofflaw wrote: »

Because fraud investigations take a long time. Shatter actually offered them more people back in mid-2011, but they refused on the basis that it takes years for someone to become of use in a fraud investigation, and having a bunch of trainees around would slow things down rather than speed them up.

cordially,
Scofflaw

This actually raises an interesting point.
What experience have the Gardaí, or indeed any of our state's investigatory services, of investigating such a complex and massive area ?

We are talking about banking, CFDs, complex transactions involving things like offshore accounts in offshore banks and sales of subsidary banks in Austria (don't forget that little episode - sorry putting on my conspiracy hat there ) ?
When if ever have the Garda investigated something of this scale and complexity ?

Even trained forensic accountants would probably have to get to grip with complex banking products and instruments first.

And there was no way the CB or IFRSA should be involved as it would be akin to having the Taliban help investigate the attack on 911.

View

Cody Pomeray wrote: »

Why not? Why not the accounting treatment I referred to, or the legislative protections?

Because they didn't apply at the time hence no one was using them as a basis for their decision making.

Maybe they should have been doing so but they weren't...

Cody Pomeray

View wrote: »

Because they didn't apply at the time hence no one was using them as a basis for their decision making.

Maybe they should have been doing so but they weren't...

What do you mean they didn't apply at the time, don't you understand that's the question I'm asking you? There was no rule prohibiting such an accounting treatment as i proposed or debt buyback or emergency legislation, I don't know what you're talking about here. These protections are features of the default event or restructuring event as it would emerge in its course.

Chips Lovell

Sierra Oscar wrote: »

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

At least three different groups had copies of the tapes, according to the Times today:

The family of bankrupt businessman Seán Quinn, the Garda Bureau of Fraud Investigation and the Office of the Director of Corporate Enforcement are among those who have copies of some of the recordings.

Gloomtastic!

Dammit Scofflaw, you make an interesting argument! (How the hell are you doing any work though! )

I've a couple of problems with all this....

1. The night of the Guarantee. Why no documentation, no recordings, no minutes? That has to be the ace up any conspiracy theorist's sleeve. If they have nothing to hide ie they were just incompetent idiots, then why destroy all the evidence?

2. Post Guarantee. We've had two Chairmen in Anglo, working on the State's behalf seemingly. They didn't find, or have not revealed publicly, any evidence that corresponds with these recordings. Why not? If they destroyed evidence, and I believe it would be hard to hide such a large hole in the books when you know what you're looking for, then surely that's a criminal offence.

I'm waiting to see what's the biggie in tomorrow's Indo before I decide to go on this march or not. I think they're saving the best til last. :eek:

Dannyboy83

Scofflaw wrote: »

And that makes people think that when I say "no, they were probably trying to do their best, but were honestly incompetent and suffering from the handicap of a decade of their own policy of negligence" I'm somehow excusing them, because I'm not getting on the 100% condemnation bandwagon.
That's not correct, though - I'd be happy to see them imprisoned (since we've given up the death penalty) on that basis. I don't need them to be villains - for me, it's quite sufficient that they were self-satisfied and self-deluding idiots, because they were in positions of responsibility. Nor is spreading the responsibility a way of excusing anyone - on the contrary, focusing on one or two individual politicians excuses a rather large number of senior civil servants who are, from my perspective, equally if not more deserving of prison time.

No, in fairness you've been more than clear that you hold nothing but disdain for them, so you shouldn't think that anyone perceives you as excusing them, that is definitely not the case.

I can't agree with your position when there are so many unanswered questions regarding Sean Quinn's exposure and the alleged instruction to the NTMA to bail out Anglo, I'm of the opinion that's it a very fine example of Plausible Deniability - however, I accept it's currently conjecture and I understand that you need more substantial evidence before your position can change.

Thanks for explaining your opinion.

Chips Lovell

Gloomtastic! wrote: »

2. Post Guarantee. We've had two Chairmen in Anglo, working on the State's behalf seemingly. They didn't find, or have not revealed publicly, any evidence that corresponds with these recordings. Why not? If they destroyed evidence, and I believe it would be hard to hide such a large hole in the books when you know what you're looking for, then surely that's a criminal offence.

Given that the tapes, and plenty more, are already in the hands of the Guards and the ODCE, why do you think they are sitting on evidence?

View

Cody Pomeray wrote: »

What do you mean they didn't apply at the time, don't you understand that's the question I'm asking you? There was no rule prohibiting such an accounting treatment as i proposed or debt buyback or emergency legislation, I don't know what you're talking about here. These protections are features of the default event or restructuring event as it would emerge in its course.

I was pointing out that they did not apply at the time. I wasn't getting into what could have applied had the Oireachtas decided to follow a different course of action than the one it chose.

I would imagine the politicians believed that they were engaged in damage control and were seeking to minimise the damage. Since we don't have the option of running "real-time" simulations to see what was the best decision they should have made, it is a bit of a moot point at this stage.

Cody Pomeray

View wrote: »

I was pointing out that they did not apply at the time. I wasn't getting into what could have applied had the Oireachtas decided to follow a different course of action than the one it chose.

Then your contribution amounts to relaying the fact that there was no restructuring. Ok...I don't see the relevance. Nobody is disputing the fact that there was no restructuring.

I am responding to the simplistic line that gets dredged up in relation to parental pensions. Whatever pensions or trusts were still invested in the Irish banking system could have been managed using legislation, or buybacks, or by non inclusion of security held to maturity.

K-9

One of the Indo journalists said the source wasn't disgruntled over the slow pace of the investigations, that would suggest to me it is somebody who is aware of the complexity of the investigation, how pain stakingly slow it is and probably thinks now is the opportune time to release them.

The journalist also suggested it wasn't one source, and they've got new stuff recently, as in the last week or so. I really don't get the conspiracy or political side to it. It's in the public interest that we get to hear the tapes and that's all that matters to me.

jmayo

Scofflaw wrote: »

I may of course have got a little carried away...no, it's obviously not something that can be ignored in itself, and if it were a systemic issue then I would consider it as very serious indeed. That is, if the banks were somehow going around their Regulator to let the Taoiseach know their real position on a regular basis, and the Taoiseach was then arranging things in favour of the banks while keeping their Regulator in the dark, that would obviously be a huge issue.

First off the regulator was always a joke, not looking after anyone's interest bar that of the banks.
As can be shown by the first regulator, liam o'reilly, who in my opinion should have been charged with dereliction of duty when he affectively lent on AIB auditor Eugene McErlean to withdraw allegations of overcharging against his employer AIB.
In fact when we talk of freedom of information and recordings of meetings, just remember Eugene McErlean had to go to the European Commission in 2008 to get the notes and minutes of his meeting with former IFSRA head, liam o'reilly, released to him.
Now if that organisation would not release information detailing minutes about an overcharging conversation (relating to over charging of around 60 odd million) then as sure as hell they would not release or probably even keep notes on matters such as bailing out the the mulit billion mess they had allowed in the Irish banks.

Scofflaw wrote: »

In this case, though, that's not what's being claimed. I'm not even sure exactly what's being claimed, other than "Cowen knew" (knew what?) and that because (?) of whatever he knew he then "corruptly" (?) included Anglo in the blanket guarantee. Unfortunately, that doesn't make a blind bit of sense to me. The "corruptly" seems to be in there because otherwise it's more sensible to say that if Cowen did know that Anglo was completely screwed, he would have done his best to avoid the utter political disaster of including them in the guarantee, because they would have a very good chance of bringing the whole house of cards down around everybody's ears.

cowen probably didn't know the full extent to exactly how bad it was (they proably told him in terms of how many pints so guiness they needed), but it is inconceivable that he hadn't an idea it was bad.

The downfall of Anglo didn't just suddenly appear in Sept 2008, it's slide had been signposted for months.
And in those months cowen and others had dinners, rounds of golf, etc with Anglo executives and board members.

Hell even the plebs in the street were getting wind of bad things in the banks and had started moving their money to the Post Office and calling joe duffy.

The idea of the guarantee was just to kick the can down the road.
Sure with a state gurantee wouldn't everything be hunky dory.
But a few saw the error and I remember some pointing out, even around these parts, that the Irish state could never ever guarantee the whole shooting match.

Elsewhere you did point to something very relevant here.
Top people in Dept of Finance, CB and IFSRA, some of whom are probably still around today had to have an inkling of what way the wind was blowing.
Ireland is not that big and people talk.

There is a permanent government in Ireland, just like in the UK, and these people will always try and protect themselves and their position.
The names and faces may change, but they always protect their patch and if that means protecting their errant forebearers then so be it.
Look how excercised the judiciary got when it thought it was being threatened even with just a pay cut.

Yes you can call me a conspiracist all you want, but there is no way top people in the civil service will ever accept any of the blame for this mess.
And there are people within the top echelons of the Dept of Finance and regulatory authorities who should be hung drawn and quartered for their negligence.
Blaming one or two bankers and a couple of politicans is simplistic.

BTW can someone confirm that two of the stars of these Anglo tapes were working, courtesy of the taxpayers, for IBRC until quiet recent ?