Author: Philip Lane

Exposure Fears for “Irish” Banks ?

Post author By Philip Lane
Post date December 2, 2010

The lead story in the Companies & Markets section of today’s FT carries this headline and focuses on the high apparent exposures of “Irish” Banks to Portugal, Greece and Spain: you can read the story here.

I am pretty sure that the exposures of the banks that are underwritten by the Irish State to these countries must be quite small. Rather, the high numbers in the BIS dataset reflect the activities of international banks that have operations in the IFSC – these banks do not have a role in the Irish domestic financial system.

(This is a periodic story that is re-reported with every release of BIS data.)

Categories In Banking Crisis
Tags Irish BIS data
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Forfas: Review of Labour Cost Competitiveness

Post author By Philip Lane
Post date November 29, 2010

This report is available here.

Summary:

This report examines the scale of the competitiveness challenge facing Irish firms and considers the reasons and implications for the deterioration in Ireland’s cost base over recent years. It looks at recent labour market developments in terms of employment and earnings trends including setting earnings trends against the international context and wage movements in key competitor locations. The report also provides an overview of the key drivers of labour costs and the impact of a range of factors on Irish wage levels is assessed. Drawing all of this analysis together, the report identifies a set of actions designed to improve the efficiency of the labour market, facilitating employment creation and protecting real incomes.