Bank liquidity stress tests will delay sale of EBS

[BoyRacer]

Bank liquidity stress tests will delay sale of EBS - Jon Ihle -> tribune.ie/business/news/art … le-of-ebs/

Upcoming stress tests on bank capital and liquidity will delay completion of the sale of EBS, according to sources involved in the negotiations.
Final revised bids to buy the nationalised former mutual are due on 17 January, having been pushed back from 21 December. Uncertainty over the outcome of Central Bank assessments of the covered banks’ capital and funding in March looks set to postpone a resolution until April at the earliest, sources said.

there is more

[yoganmahew]

Not as much as the EU competition authority, no?

[BottomsUp]

irishtimes.com/newspaper/bre … ing33.html

EU agrees new bank stress tests

European finance ministers inched forward towards beefing up the euro zone’s rescue fund and preparing new stress tests for the region’s shaky banks, dashing market hopes of quicker action.

The sluggish approach could test the patience of investors, spooked by the euro zone debt crisis, who sold off peripheral euro zone bonds this month until the European Central Bank intervened to steady markets.

Ministers of the 17-nation currency area explored ways to raise the effective lending capacity of their financial backstop but reached no conclusion, and they remain locked in dispute on tougher criteria for checking banks’ ability to resist shocks.

The risk premium on 10-year Portuguese and Irish government bonds rose as traders took stock of the news, or lack of news, from Brussels.

There is more.

[Arthur_Daley]

Cardinal increases bid for EBS to over €600mSIMON CARSWELL, Finance Correspondent

A PRIVATE equity consortium led by Dublin firm Cardinal has increased the upfront cash injection it is willing to invest in EBS building society to a sum believed to be in excess of €600 million as final bids for the lender closed.

Cardinal, which is backed by the billionaire New York investor Wilbur Ross and US private equity firm Carlyle, and Irish Life Permanent submitted final bids for the State-owned lender by yesterday’s deadline.

Under a previous offer, Cardinal had offered to inject up to €525 million into EBS initially to meet earlier capital requirements set by the Financial Regulator.

irishtimes.com/newspaper/finance/2011/0118/1224287761545.html

Vulture capital planning to fork out 600m for an Irish mortgage book. How does this square with Morgan Kelly’s second wave of mortgage defaults?

Who’ll fund a deal like this, when the market capitalisation of bank and AIB are so depressed. Seeing cold cash like this gives a feeling we’re not in Kansas anymore.