Ireland's chances of qualifying for monetary union are now rated very strongly by the international investment community, according to the latest JP Morgan calculator. They show that Ireland's rating has climbed sharply over the last month and now stands at 96 per cent. The strong increase follows last month's meeting of EU finance ministers and the rising confidence internationally that EMU will go ahead on schedule on January 1st, 1999.

The EMU calculator is derived from the forward interest rate swaps market, in which investors swap future floating-rate interest payments for fixed rate ones. The increase in Ireland's rating indicates that the spreads between these swap rates in Ireland has now fallen almost to German levels as investors are now betting that Ireland will qualify for monetary union and join in the first group.

It represents a major turnaround from a earlier in the summer. Only two countries now have a higher rating than Ireland and investors are betting that EMU will go ahead on time with a large group of countries in the first wave.