NPV of NAMA to Green Party Leaders: Zero.

NPV of NAMA to Taxpayers: €38 billion in lost interest
(assuming ‘break-even’ from forced house-price-inflation causing homelessness).

NPV of Mr Gormley’s Pension - Oct 2009: Not bad.
Escape from Ringsend’s lousy bicycle paths and incinerator. Free at last.

NPV of Mr Gormley’s Pension - Oct 2012: Excellent.
Retirement in Bali. Lucrative directorships in the Green Friends-of-EPA Industry.

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_qdRqFPGZw2o/SqQNPClC5aI/AAAAAAAABzo/pEKy_UccBJc/s1600-h/thegormley-5.gif

There is no room in Ireland for honest economic argument only political argument and the political arguments boils down to political maneuvering.

This is a sad day for Ireland and a great day for FF.

@ Concubhar O’Caolai

“Go Greens! ”

The are going, some are already gone but the rest of them have just handed in their notice!

Pending legislation, all credit institutions participating in NAMA or availing of a Government Guarantee will be expected to comply fully with the key principles of the ‘Combined Code’, subject only to necessary adaptations agreed with the Minister for Finance or the Financial Regulator.

The Government’s approach to asset valuation within the NAMA initiative is a carefully balanced and reasonable approach, having regard to the need to stabilise the financial system and to ensure that the economy has access to credit and financial services.

Alternative approaches risk leaving the banking system impaired and without access to funds or capital for future development.

Public concern in relation to the risk undertaken by the Exchequer is, of course, appropriate, and entirely shared by the Government who have taken considerable steps within the proposed NAMA legislation to mitigate and control risks and ensure the best possible return for the taxpayer.

Included among the measures to mitigate risk is the proposal that a portion of the consideration for the assets transferred would be in the form of issued subordinated bonds, ensuring that risks are shared by the institutions.

In addition, the Government has always stated that, should NAMA make a loss over time, a levy would be imposed to recoup the cost to taxpayers. The Government proposes to amend the legislation to ensure this levy is put on a statutory basis.

This levy will be dealt with in the legislation establishing the Agency, having regard to the importance of maintaining the sustainability and stability of financial institutions. Any such levy would arise only if NAMA has made a loss on its eventual wind-up or after 10 years, and would be carefully judged so as not to disrupt the stability and sustainability of the banking system.

PfG revealed:

http://www.scribd.com/doc/20877317/Renewed-Programme-for-Government-10-10-09

Just my little comment on the Pea’s in our time Theme:

http://www.politics.ie/2181280-post155.html

“Almunia should save his advice for Spain an economy nearly as bad as Ireland which became like that under his stewardship or does he just want to turn the Irish people into his laboratory rats!”

Welcome to post Lisbon Europe.

You just met your new Minister for Finance.

This Program for government document like the last one is not worth the paper it is written on. It is really, really sad to see how FF are getting 100% what they want, 100% what they need which is NAMA.

Once they have got that over the line, finito. Lenihan will not even bother to contest the next election leaving it to the Greens to knock on doors and explain why they allowed themselves to be fooled not once but twice!

Second time is much more serious than the first. Because, it involves saddling us with debt that will ensure a zombified banking and economic system for 10 to 15 years minimum as we can only watch in horror at the mother of all quangos drain the life blood from the economy.

Almunia should save his advice for Spain an economy nearly as bad as Ireland which became like that under his stewardship or does he just want to turn the Irish people into his laboratory rats!

Nama has turned into a dogs dinner. It is as if an eccentric artist of our acquaintance, Brian Van Lenihan, offered to to paint us a giant classical style landscape painting for a small fee. But instead he covered his bicycle wheels in paint and cycled round and round. We were horrified, as were 46 passing art critics. Lenihan reacted by briefing local journalists to attack the motives of the art critics. Several other buyers of Lenihans work, worried about damage to their investments from the controversy, have gathered around our house demanding that we agree to buy the painting. We have been badly hit by the recession, and he is proposing an unusual scheme where the price of the painting will be related to the future value of the Irish property market. The protesters have now been outside the house for months, and Lenihan is telling journalists that we will “end up like the Icelands”, a local family who bought ten of his paintings and whose house mysteriously burnt down. Now two artists of our acquaintance, Eamon & John, both keen organic gardeners, have negotiated a compromise with Lenihan. If we still don’t like the painting in fifteen years he will come back and throw five buckets of paint over it.

Good story.

Much better than the one the Green Party will hear tomorrow.

But a story it will be.

Nama did seem plausible at the beginning. The analogy I would use is that of fostering children. The way social worker Brian Lenihan soothingly described it made it sound like we were minding some problem children for the banks because they were too ill to take care of them. While we fostered their troublesome children they would give plenty of love and care to their other younger children. But instead of the troubled but decent kids we thought we were getting we now learn they are really violent criminal chavs. Also, we are now being asked to give a cash reward to the parents, not usually a part of a fostering process. Especially strange as one of them owns a Polish Estate and the other owns a palace on College Green. The parents children are malnourished, but they intend to feed them only on bread and water for the next five to ten years. Unless that is we give them more cash gifts. As a concession, Lenihan, who has only been in the social services for a short time, having previously been a police man, is offering to give us back one third of the cash gift if the children violently assault us before the age of eighteen. Our Uncles Eamon and John, also social workers (and both keen organic gardeners), who have negotiated with Lenihan on our behalf, have now come back with a deal. A special tax will be charged on the parents if their violent children assault us. But they say they have no money to feed their starving kids at the moment. We will have to wait for their children to grow up before we see any of the money. And in the mean time they may starve their children even more to save up the money to pay for the tax!

Ideally we would suspend social worker Lenihan and our gullible uncles. But I think at the very least we should all accept that this adoption process cannot go ahead as planned.

Lets follow the advice of our good friend, world renowned child psychologist, Dr Joseph Stiglitz.

(For those of you who need an ending, we send the violent children to a boarding school, Bondholder College, where they thrive, and we ensure that the loving but chaotic parents mend their ways. And we all live happily ever after. The End)

It’s not over till the fat lady sings.

Although she may be warming up.

Not much sleep for the Green membership tonight.

Thanks for the NAMA ver. hist.

Just had a look at Constantin’s completely out of sequence Nama Trust proposal (aka Nama 3.0) on true economics.

http://trueeconomics.blogspot.com/2009/09/economics-23092009-cost-of.html

Jeez, you gotta give the guy credit, very closely argued, I would need a week to read it.

But he seems a good guy, one of the 46?

Wasn’t that how the insurance levy worked?

Interesting that the Greens would rather walk around in hydrocarbon made polyester than a natural product like fur

民家 = houses of the people.

’some kind of ECB tracker mortgage’. That’s very good. Best laugh I’ve had all day.

@Zhou

Glad someone here understands version numbering!

I can’t believe that mink farms are the new realpolitik.

Predicition. The government will fall next week.

I believe that’s what John O’Donoghue is betting on anyway

NAMA 1.0 = original draft legislation
NAMA 2.0 = Honohan risk sharing
NAMA 2.1 = NAMA as introduced to the Dail with limited risk sharing
NAMA 2.2 = Further Green tweaks

The problem with NAMA 2.2 is that it may tie the Govts hands at committee stage when trying to get NAMA 2.3 with the other parties at committee stage.

I think the Green party should vote to give their leaders discretion.

what was put on the table by the govt last month, NAMA 1.0, or NAMA 1.1 (risk sharing), or did it become NAMA 2.1 given that it took in risk sharing, albeit by a different methodology? I suppose 2.2 makes sense if it just increase the risk sharing but doesn’t have much else ‘new’.

NAMA 2.1 = ?

Just curious, thanks

Constantin Gurdgiev has already (unjustifiably imho) purloined the “NAMA 3.0″ moniker. Perhaps he can be displaced/

I would call this latest version “NAMA 2.2″ unless there is a radical shift in approach.

Apologies - I didn’t realise a Green member had brought up the mink farms. In fairness, few Greens are focussing in this and it is largely RTE presenters and internet wing-nuts on other sites who are mischievously trying to make this an issue imho.

I agree that some of the Green demands will undermine the NAMA solution.

The mink farm is not a slur, it was said on the radio. It is a further example of the total incoherance of this goverment respones to the crisis.
First come up with NAMA -a reasonable & pragmatic solution to the crisis
Secondly bring in policies that undermine the value of the collatoral -reducing mortgage interest relief, tax 2nd homes, windfall taxes, increased marginal tax rates on the buying cohort
thirdly-settle on a valuation of the assets, with no disclosure on the how you got there and why you paid a premium
fourthly why include a broken bank in the scheme, if half the capacity of NAMA goes to Anglo how does this encourage lending.
then bring in half assed risk sharing in terms of sub debt and a levy which are impossible to price
then leave out a recap scheme entirely.
We have not even discussed the isse of whether NAMA can fulfill its mandate, what staff does it have do do its job.

Your empathetic analysis of the Green Party quandary is succinct.

My one quibble would be that I don’t think they will get any time to implement a New PfG.

A horrific budget, public sector strikes, 450,000 unemployed etc.

Even if the Government get through this weekend I cannot see them surviving more than a few months.

My personal view, and I have voted Green, is that while it would be painful they would best serve their agenda by revisiting their ethical position.

I have commented before that if the Greens were on the opposition benches they would be screaming blue murder over NAMA. There’s no getting away from that.

I think strategically the Green habit of putting motions to the members on issues of policy is self defeating. It may be democratic for the Greens to give members a say, but it does nothing for their attractiveness as future coalition partners (when and if they rebuild). Imagine a major party who needs five or six seats. If the Greens are one among several options they may be less attractive because they effectively repeatedly hold a gun to the head of the major party at the whim of the membership. Not an attractive prospect. Perhaps I over-estimate this as a negative feature but it surely will come into play.