Madam, – The Central Bank has revealed that €40 billion left Irish deposits in the month of December. I can only conclude that even though some of these deposits were guaranteed by the State, these investors are looking at Ireland in a negative way. This is evidenced in the daily talk by aspiring politicians to renegotiate the IMF/EU loans, burn the bondholders and do away with the bank guarantee scheme.
So what do the financial watchers from afar see unfolding in this economy? They see increasing potential to diminish their investments given a possible coalition government with opposing ideologies. What happens next? They transfer their billions to economies that don’t engage in this type of rhetoric. Politicians have unfortunately, through pointscoring, sent a message to the outside world that Ireland is not a safe place to do business. If the flight of deposits continues at this rate there will be no need to reform the financial sector – it just won’t exist.
It is worth thinking through the implications for people who work in the financial sector whose jobs are being undermined. The daily attacks on what politicians are going to do regarding renegotiating agreements that have been made in good faith can only serve to portray us in a negative light. – Yours, etc,