Yesterday’s High Court decision dealt what may prove a fatal blow to McInerney’s bid to stave off receivership, but the warning bells have been ringing for the homebuilding firm for some time, the Irish Times reported in an analysis. At the height of the boom in 2007, McInerney, one of the country’s oldest homebuilders, had revenues in excess of €200 million and was expanding quickly. However, the collapse in the Irish property and construction sector hit its business hard. By 2008 it was in the red, posting a loss of €47 million. In 2009 it lost another €25 million.

The Byrne Hotel Group, which owns three hotels in Galway, is in talks with its banks over debts of more than €43.5 million, The Irish Times reported. The company does not expect to be able to make any capital repayments over the coming years and is in discussions to put all loans on an interest-only basis for five years, according to recently filed accounts for its group holding company R Byrne Concrete Ltd. The group owns the Victoria Hotel, the Eyre Square Hotel and the Salthill Hotel, all in Galway, as well as the Metro Hotel in Leicestershire, England, and other property.

The EU authorities and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) have relaxed a tight deadline set in the bailout deal for the Government to establish “ambitious” new loan-to-deposit ratio targets for Ireland’s struggling banks, the Irish Times reported. The high loan-to-deposit ratios of Ireland’s banks, a legacy of imprudent property lending and declining deposits, are a key measure of their weakness.

A survey from property website Daft.ie has found that asking prices for homes fell by 14% last year, with prices falling by 5% in the final three months of the year, RTE News reported. Daft.ie says prices have now fallen by 40% from their peak, with the average price now just below €220,000. During 2010, asking prices in Dublin fell 14% on average, compared to a fall of 15% outside major cities. Prices in Galway were 13% lower than a year before, after prices fell sharply in the final quarter of the year.

Kathleen Dwyer, the court-appointed trustee for David Drumm’s estate, trawled through his Irish and US bank accounts yesterday, at the former Anglo chief executive’s third bankruptcy hearing in Boston, the Irish Times reported. Yesterday’s hearing highlighted the awkward duty of Ms Dwyer to maximise the amount of Mr Drumm’s estate so it can be distributed to his creditors, while at the same time suing his main creditor, Anglo.

Celtic Bookmakers has gone into receivership, according to a statement by the company’s owner Ivan Yates, Business & Leadership reported. Yates, a broadcaster on radio station Newstalk and former Fine Gael minister, owns the independent chain of betting shops with his wife Deirdre. AIB appointed Neil Hughes of Hughes Blake Accountants to Celtic Bookmakers on Tuesday. The statement from the Yates’ said that job losses were inevitable but they would endeavour to keep as many stores open as possible by selling them as going concerns.

The European Union has successfully sold €5 billion in bonds which will be used to fund its contribution to Ireland's bailout, The Irish Times reported. The bond sale, which took place this morning, was three times over-subscribed and was sold out within an hour, the EU said. According to Bloomberg, the five-year notes were priced to yield 12 basis points more than the benchamrk swap rate, or about 2.5 per cent. That compares with 1.77 per cent on similar-maturity German government debt and 2.08 per cent on French bonds according to Bloomberg data.

An average of 30 companies went to the wall and an estimated 1,075 jobs were lost every week during 2010, according to figures released yesterday, the Irish Times reported. Information compiled by corporate restructuring specialists Kavanagh Fennell, publishers of the Insolvency Journal, show that more than 1,500 firms went into liquidation, receivership or examinership in the Republic because they were unable to pay debts.

Ireland's minister for finance, Brian Lenihan, announced plans to effectively nationalize Allied Irish Banks PLC with a capital injection of €3.7 billion ($4.85 billion), giving the government ownership of more than 90 percent, the Wall Street Journal reported today. Allied Irish Banks received €3.5 billion in state aid in 2009, but the bank needs another €3.7 billion by year end to meet its target of boosting its core Tier 1 capital to 8 percent of risk-weighted assets.

Ireland's Finance Minister Brian Lenihan today announced plans to recapitalize Allied Irish Banks PLC by €3.7 billion ($3.93 billion) to meet the financial regulator's year-end capital requirements, effectively making it the fourth Irish lender to be nationalized, the Wall Street Journal reported today. Allied Irish Banks already received €3.5 billion in state aid in 2009, but the bank needs another €3.7 billion by year-end to meet its 8% Core Tier 1 target and, observers say, another €6.1 billion by the end of February to meet the financial regulator's 12% Core Tier 1 target.