EBS makes €1bn senior bonds error

The Central Bank of Ireland last week issued a corrected version of its 2nd March publication of the bondholder positions in the six State-guaranteed Irish financial institutions (AIB, Anglo, Bank of Ireland, EBS, Irish Life and INBS). The correction of nearly €1bn was to reflect an error identified during the recent stress tests. EBS told the CBI that its senior unguaranteed secured bonds totalled €1.05bn whereas they in fact total €1.991bn, a difference of €0.941bn.

The CBI calls it a “clarification”. It might more properly be called a correction, and that would be polite. Is the management of Irish financial institutions so incompetent that it can under-report an important statistic which was intended to inform public debate, to such a significant extent?

Anyway, here is the corrected version of the bondholder positions in the State-guaranteed financial institutions. The only changes are to the EBS senior unguaranteed secured bondholder total and to the overall total for that category of bondholder across all six institutions.

(Click to enlarge)

Here is the old incorrect version. The press release from the CBI on 2nd March 2011 seems to have been removed from its website.