NatWest’s PTSB plans, Declan Kelly’s episode, and five economic reasons to be cheerful

UK banking giant NatWest Group may take a sizeable minority stake in Permanent TSB (PTSB) as part of a deal to sell a large part of its Ulster Bank unit's loans, reports Joe Brennan. He writes that PTSB is understood to be interested in about €9 billion of Ulster Bank's €20 billion loan book as well as deposits and part of the UK-owned bank's branch network.

Irishman Declan Kelly, an influential adviser to Fortune 500 executives, has lost his board seat at the campaign group Global Citizen and ceded some of his responsibilities as head of the strategy firm Teneo after a drunken episode at a fundraising concert. Arash Massoudi, Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson and Mark Paul report.

Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway put an additional €40 million into its Dublin-based European insurance company in February to bolster its capital levels, according to accounts just filed. Ciarán Hancock has that story.

As debate on reopening society rages amid growth in the Delta variant of Covid-19, Mark Paul says now is the time for cool heads among decision makers. In his Caveat column, he identifies the key issues at play, particularly urging the Government to settle the row over using antigen tests. He also suggests that the timely introduction of a Covid pass linked to full vaccination could have rendered many of the current discussions academic.

John FitzGerald: Fears of surge in Irish house prices over next 18 months

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Ulster Bank owner may take Permanent TSB stake in loans deal

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Declan Kelly leaves charity board after drunken behaviour at party

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Planning expert claims housing supply will be ‘strangled’ by judicial reviews

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And still on Covid and the economy, Eoin Burke-Kennedy has his optimist's hat on today, findingfive reasons to be positive about our economic position. It seems things are not all bad, particularly not on the personal savings front.

John FitzGerald also covers this theme in his economics column, specifically asking how the release of these record levels of savings will affect the housing market. He considers the role of regulatory mortgage rules in influencing prices, concluding that the ball on this front falls much more squarely into the Government's court.

In our Work section, Olive Keogh considers how on-the-job learning has adapted to our Covid lifestyles, finding employers have become much more accepting of e-learning. Online training in career development is here to stay, she writes.

This week's Wild Goose is Enniscrone, Co Sligo native David Lynott, who tells Pádraig Collins he left home at 25 looking for adventure but just didn't quite know how much of it lay in his future. Lynott is now based in Queenstown, New Zealand, where he has a successful business running "shark boats", submersible watercraft that can travel underwater.

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