Today’s developments that Minister Noonan hopes to see parts of the Anglo debt reduced are most welcome. From an Irish Times report:
On the Anglo debts, Mr Noonan said troika officials were preparing a joint technical paper, drawing on Irish suggestions, to reduce the overall burden involved in repaying the principal of the €31 billion promissory note.
This loan arrangement predates the EU-IMF programme and was agreed to fund an effectively insolvent Anglo Irish Bank but is seen by the Government as too expensive.
“We think there’s a less expensive way of doing it by financial engineering, and we’re not talking about private-sector involvement or restructuring,” said Mr Noonan in Berlin.
Writing in the latest issue of Business and Finance, Karl makes a similar point. Read the entire piece, especially a precise description of what promissory notes are and how they work, but this quote struck me as important.
It is true that the Irish taxpayer has taken on far too big a burden in ensuring that bondholders at Anglo and INBS were repaid. But quibbling about bondholders misses the elephant in the room. It is the huge burden of repaying ELA, not bondholders, that is going to bleed the taxpayer dry for the next twenty years.
It is time for the Irish government to declare that it has no intention of putting €3.1 billion towards repaying ELA in March and that it has arranged an agreement in principle with the Central Bank of Ireland that the state will repay this debt when it has fully recovered from its current crisis.
If my understanding of the legal situation is correct, then Patrick Honohan would only require the support of seven other members of the ECB Governing Council to proceed with this plan. This could easily be achieved with the support of Mario Draghi. Ireland has borne a heavy burden in the name of European financial stability. It’s time for a quid pro quo from super Mario.