CENTRAL BANK OF IRELAND BEGINS QUANTITATIVE EASING PROGRAMME - The Central Bank of Ireland marked the beginning of the European Central Bank quantitative easing scheme by buying up Irish sovereign bonds.
Although the Dame Street institution is understood to have intervened in the market for Irish debt yesterday, the scale of its purchases is unclear. As the 19-month ECB programme proceeds, traders anticipate that the Central Bank will spend between €500 million and €700 million per month on Irish debt, writes the Irish Times. The yield on Irish 10-year bonds dropped 3 basis points to finish yesterday’s session at 0.83%. The decline was considerably less than the 8-10 basis point decline in the yields of larger euro zone countries, leading traders to conclude that bond-buying by the central banks of Germany and France were larger than the purchases in smaller countries. This is in line with the principle under which bonds are being acquired according to the ECB capital key, in which major countries have the biggest share of the ECB capital. “US yields are down 4 basis points at the 10-year level and Germany is down 8 basis points. You could say that, partly because of the start of QE [quantitative easing], there could be an effect on European markets,” said Dermot O’Leary, chief economist at Goodbody stockbrokers.
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PAYZONE SOLD BY BACKERS TO PRIVATE EQUITY FUND - Payment processing business Payzone Ireland has been sold by its private equity backers Duke Street in a deal understood to value the Irish operations at €30m to €40m. Carlyle Cardinal Ireland (CCI), a private equity fund founded two years ago by US-based Carlyle Group and Cardinal Capital Group, an Irish investment house, announced the deal yesterday. CCI has agreed to acquire Payzone Ireland from Duke Street, which led a 2010 buyout of the company and held an 80% stake in the business, says the Irish Independent. Staff at Dublin headquartered Payzone are understood to have been briefed on the sale yesterday. The change in ownership will have no impact on the day-to-day business operations of Payzone in Ireland, CCI said in a statement. Incumbent management including Mike Maloney, Jim Deignan and Nigel Bell, will remain in their roles and will retain an ownership stake under the new deal. Payzone provides a variety of payment services in Ireland, ranging from machines that allow customers to pay utility bills to the M50 toll payments service E-Flow. It also runs Dublin's Leap Card transport payment system and a mobile payments service for car parking. The company developed out of the 2007 merger of Irish e-payments group Alphyra and British ATM operator Cardpoint.
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NEW WATERFORD-LUTON ROUTES SAVES AIRPORT - Waterford Airport’s future looks secure following confirmation that flights on the Waterford-London/Luton route are to resume at the end of April. Waterford was left without direct flights to the London area following the decision by Aer Lingus Regional, formerly Aer Arann, to pull out of the facility over two years ago, says the Irish Examiner. Belgian-based VLM Airlines is set to operate the Luton route 12 times a week in each direction. The news comes just as UK-based Flybe ends its services between Waterford and Manchester and Waterford and Birmingham, which would have left the regional airport without commercial flights. Waterford has received Government funding of over €1m annually in recent years in the form of an operational subvention. Flights will begin on Monday, April 27, on a Fokker 50 aircraft, which has capacity for 50 passengers. Meanwhile, VLM will also operate a four-times-weekly service between Waterford and Birmingham. VLM Airlines has flown in Europe since 1993 with its first service on the Antwerp-London City route.
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PRIVATE EQUITY EXECUTIVE ORDER TO PAY £72m TO EX-WIFE - A former private equity executive must pay his ex-wife £72.3m in one of the biggest divorce awards to be made by the English courts in recent years. Randy Work, a former executive at Lone Star, had argued to the High Court that his estranged wife Mandy Gray should be entitled to only £5m ($7.5m) of his estimated £150m ($225m) fortune because of a postnuptial agreement the US-born couple had negotiated in Texas. Mr Work’s lawyers had argued she should be prevented from receiving a more substantial sum or anything other than the £5m they said was her own property. Legal costs for the case are estimated at between £2m and £3m. However, Mr Justice Holman ordered on Friday that Mr Work, who was the breadwinner in the marriage, should give his wife half his assets because the couple had been equal partners in a relationship of more than 20 years. The judge said in his ruling that: “This should be the easiest of cases to settle,” but that recent hearings had instead been marked by “unedifying and destructive pugilism”. On Monday it was agreed by the two sides that Mr Work, who was not in court, would pay the £72m in two instalments. Mr Work’s lawyers had also argued that he was entitled to a greater share of the couple’s assets because he made a special contribution through his wealth creating skills.
