The annual cost of servicing the debt associated with the financial sector bailout in Ireland in 2008 is estimated at about €1.6 billion, according to figures provided by Minister for Finance Michael Noonan, the Irish Times reported. This is from an expected cost of €8 billion to service Ireland’s sizeable national debt this year. The Department of Finance has also estimated that about €41 billion of our national debt is associated with the cost of rescuing the financial sector, said the Minister in a written reply to Fianna Fáil’s finance spokesman Michael McGrath.

Ireland's recovery is under way, but its fragile lenders and the large amounts of debt held by households pose considerable threats to stability, the Irish central bank said Thursday, in a report aimed at identifying the substantial risks faced by the country, The Wall Street Journal reported. Marking significant milestones, the country exited its three-year international bailout in December and has regained full access to government debt markets, at historically low yields.

The purchase of three major Irish businesses over the past two years by the billionaire businessman Denis O’Brien involved total bank write-offs of more than €300 million, the Irish Times reported. The deals saw the businessman invest €230 million to acquire the Siteserv Group, the Topaz Group and the Beacon Private Hospital. The Siteserv deal saw the State-owned Irish Bank Resolution Corporation, which is now in liquidation, write off €110 million of the €150 million it was owed.

The court-appointed trustee overseeing the US bankruptcy of property developer Sean Dunne intends to ask the American court’s permission to seek access to family law documents in Ireland, the Irish Times reported. Timothy Miltenberger, lawyer for Mr Dunne’s trustee Rich Coan, told the Connecticut bankruptcy court yesterday that he intended to apply under US bankruptcy law to obtain information about the Co Carlow developer’s finances under confidentiality conditions.

Anglo Irish Bank, the institution that brought Ireland’s financial sector crashing down in 2008, has been “finally consigned to history” as liquidators prepare to sell the last of its assets and repay its outstanding debt, according to the country’s finance minister, the Financial Times reported. Michael Noonan’s comment came as Standard & Poor’s, the rating agency, on Friday raised its long-term rating on Ireland to A minus from BBB plus, citing “brightening prospects” for the Irish economy.

The IBRC liquidation has proved a highly lucrative process for some of the best known financial and law firms in the State, the Irish Times reported. KPMG, the firm overseeing the process, racked up fees of €52 million across its Irish and UK offices but knocked €5 million off the bill at the request of the Government. The firm appears to have accrued a total of 242,000 man hours on the liquidation, which works out at €194 per hour per person. A&L Goodbody, a blue-chip Dublin law firm, was the next best earner.

Credit unions could provide billions more in loans to small- and medium-sized businesses if they were allowed to centralise funds within a new structure that was guaranteed by the State, an Oireachtas committee heard this morning, the Irish Times reported. The Joint Committee on Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation also heard however that many loan applications received from SMEs by credit unions are “unrealistic” and based on belief that “optimism will triumph over reality”.

AIB and KBC Bank have agreed a deal with the Irish Mortgage Holders Organisation (IMHO) which will allow people to be debt free within three months, therefore providing for one of the shortest effective bankruptcy terms in the world, the Irish Times reported. Under the new structure, clients of the IMHO who have an unsustainable mortgage, and who choose to voluntarily surrender their property, will be processed through an accelerated Personal Insolvency Arrangement (PIA) which will include any unsecured debt that might exist. This would include credit card debt.

Explanations from members of bankrupt businessman Sean Quinn’s family concerning transactions involving movement of substantial sums between national and international accounts in 2011 and 2012 lack “any real credibility”, the receivers appointed over the Quinns’ accounts and assets have claimed before the Commercial Court, the Irish Times reported. On consent of the Quinns, Mr Justice Peter Kelly today made orders under which various members of the family are to set out, in sworn affidavits, their explanations for 67 transactions before the matters returns to court on June 30th.

The liquidator of Pierse Contracting, once Ireland’s second-biggest construction company, began a High Court action seeking restriction orders against nine of its former directors under section 150 of the Companies Act, 1990, yesterday, the Irish Times reported. Pierse went bust in 2010 leaving a deficit of €212 million, making it one of the biggest collapses of the bust. About €50 million was owed by Pierse to unsecured creditors, including subcontractors.