Pearse Doherty questions Government will to curb vulture funds

Regulation is one way to tackle so-called vulture funds, says Sinn Féin finance spokesperson Pearse Doherty, but it is not clear whether there is a will at Government level to introduce it.

The Donegal TD told this week's Inside Business podcast that he believes the Government still wants to use these funds to "clean up the carcasses" of the commercial property sector.

Mr Doherty was speaking following the broadcast of RTÉ documentary The Great Irish Sell-Off, which reported that giant US investment funds paid miniscule amounts of tax despite making enormous profits on their Irish investments.

Irish Times markets correspondent Joe Brennan has reported widely on these funds, and spoke to the podcast about the main players in the market, the assets and loans that they have acquired and the structures they have used to lower their tax exposure.

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Up to 24 vulture funds paid less than €20,000 in tax

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One of those investment funds, Cerberus, hit the headlines over its controversial purchase of the National Asset Management Agency 's Project Eagle portfolio. Barry O'Halloran took us through the details of that and he also raised questions about whether the government may have accidentally done the wrong thing by closing the Section 110 loophole.

Also on the podcast, Mr Doherty spoke about the resignation of Martin McGuinness as Deputy First Minister of Northern Ireland. Sinn Féin were left with "no choice" he said, after successive talks between Mr McGuinness and the First Minister and DUP leader Arlene Foster came to nought.

The next step is elections, Mr Doherty said, with lengthy negotiations on the future of the power-sharing institutions in Northern Ireland to follow.