Irish Nationwide Building Society (INBS) today reiterated its willingness to demutualise as soon as the proposed legislation is passed into law.
As the society unveiled a 16 per cent increase in pretax profits to €135 million, managing director Michael Fingleton expressed disappointment at the delay in introducing an amendment to the building societies legislation - which is not expected before the end of 2005.
The amended law will release INBS of its five-year embargo on selling shares to the public once it converts to a public company.
In September last year then minister for the environment Noel Dempsey informed INBS that the legislation would be ready by Autumn 2004, according to Mr Fingleton. But this has been set back until late 2005 following the appointment of Mr Dick Roche as Mr Dempsey's successor.
Mr Fingleton said the INBS board is disappointed that the proposed legislation will not materialise until later in 2005. "Nonetheless we look forward to its publication and we are ready to implement its provisions in relation to Section 102," he said.
INBS advanced €2,378 million during 2004, an increase of 33 per cent on the previous year to give the society a loan book of €5.5 billion.
Mr Fingleton said asset quality is positive and is underpinned by low interest rates and increasing property values. "It is a reflection of the quality of the book that we repossessed only one property in 2001 and two properties in each of the years 2002, 2003 and 2004."
Mr Fingleton added Irish people have become "obsessed with property and property values".
He referred to the repeated predictions over the past ten years of a property crash yet 2004 saw a record number of houses being built and prices continuing to increase albeit at a slower rate.
"Demand in the first three months of 2005 continues to be stronger than expected and we expect in excess of 70,000 units to be built in 2005 with prices increasing in the high single digit figures," he said.