NAUGHTON AND QUINN MAKE €40m PROFIT ON IFSC BLOCKS - Another of the original tax-driven office buildings in Dublin's International Financial Services Centre has been sold in an off-market deal.
Businessmen Martin Naughton and Lochlann Quinn have secured €50 million for Harbourmaster One only weeks after disposing of another IFSC block for close to €40 million, writes the Irish Times. The two transactions have yielded overall profits of around €40 million apart altogether from the 100% capital allowances that they were able to avail of over a 10-year period after they made the original investments in the early 1990s. Mr Naughton and Mr Quinn were among a relatively small number of individual investors who bought office blocks shortly after the launch of the IFSC. Many of the newly developed investment properties with tax breaks were acquired by large investment syndicates. Harbourmaster One was originally bought for around £20.8 million (€26 million) while the second investment, George's Dock 5, cost in the region of £20 million (€24 million). Harbourmaster One has now been sold in a private transaction to Irish Life for €50 million. George's Dock 5 was acquired at the end of October by State Street for almost €40 million.
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RSA PUMPED €400m INTO IRISH UNIT FOLLOWING ACCOUNTS PROBE - British insurance giant RSA has pumped almost €400m into its Irish arm since the unit was hit with an accounting scandal in 2013. The parent group's latest injection into the Irish division means RSA has now provided almost four times the amount it initially coughed up to bolster the subsidiary when the accounting issue emerged less than two years ago, says the Irish Independent. RSA said in 2013 that it had uncovered a €274m hole in the accounts of its Irish business. A filing just lodged with the Companies Office indicates that RSA provided its Irish unit with €20m back in November. That brought the total the Irish division received last year to €137m. That was received in four tranches, of €48.7m, €48.2m, €20m and another €20m. In 2013, RSA provided the Irish unit with €261m, in tranches of €160.6m, €65.5m and €35.4m. It brings the total amount of fresh capital provided to RSA Ireland to €398m. "No substantive issues were found in 2014 but the cost of remediation, reserve strengthening and the level of required underwriting improvement was greater than expected at the start of 2014," said an RSA spokesman. "Hence capital injections were delivered to further ensure very strong ratios were maintained."
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BREXT ‘WOULD COST US €4 BILLION' - A British exit from the EU following the upcoming general election could wipe almost €4 billion off the value of Irish exports, new research shows. The exit would have significant ramifications for Ireland given its close ties to Britain particularly for exports, says the Irish Examiner. Assuming the UK would negotiate a bilateral trade agreement similar to those already in place with other countries if it were to leave the union, trade between the UK and its EU trading partners would fall almost 22%, according to ESRI associate research professor Edgar Morgenroth. While this is held up as the “worst case scenario”, the economic analyst acknowledges that individual countries may be affected to a greater or lesser degree than the 22% figure. That opens the possibility of a greater reduction in Irish exports given our ties with the British economy. Dr Morgenroth’s estimates are contained in a new book from the Institute of International and European Affairs published today, Britain and Europe: The Endgame - An Irish Perspective which looks at the potential impact of a British exit across a range of topics. Using 2012 export figures, a 21.6% average impact on exports across the EU would equate to a €3.8 billion reduction.
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ATHENS RAIDS PUBLIC HEALTH COFFERS IN HUNT FOR CASH - Greece’s government has raided the coffers of its public health service and the Athens metro as it widens a hunt for funds to keep itself afloat and service debts. Athens faces a €1.7 billion bill for wages and pensions at the end of the month and then a €450m loan payment to the International Monetary Fund on April 9, says the Financial Times. Greek government and eurozone officials believe Athens does not have funds to cover both. In another constraint on Greece’s ability to raise cash, the European Central Bank decided to impose stricter curbs on the issuance of short-term government debt. EU officials expressed hope that a marathon Monday night meeting between Alexis Tsipras, the Greek prime minister, and his German counterpart, chancellor Angela Merkel, would spark long-stalled talks over economic reforms Greece must implement to unlock €7.2 billion in frozen bailout aid. Athens has promised to deliver a list of reforms to eurozone authorities by Monday. But officials cautioned that the list would still have to be agreed with bailout inspectors before eurozone authorities could make progress on any deal to free up new funding. Though Mr Tsipras discussed his reform plans with Ms Merkel on Monday night, there were few signs that talks in Athens with bailout inspectors had become more active following the Berlin meeting.
