Showing posts with label da fundamentals are sound. Show all posts
Showing posts with label da fundamentals are sound. Show all posts

Wednesday, March 24, 2010

Willie McAteer, former executive director of Anglo Irish Bank


Oireachtas Finance Committee, 2 Jul 2008:

"We are often wrong but we have a strong belief that we have significant and sufficient capital to meet even worse scenarios than we envisage. If bad debts and the economy get worse, we believe we are sufficiently capitalised."

[...]

Clearly, the whole perception of Ireland and the negative sentiment towards it are obviously of concern to us. However, this sentiment is not borne out by fundamentals. We are travelling, as are many of the people here, to try to make sure that the perception of Ireland internationally is true and not a false, sentiment driven one.

[...]

We have the best interest of the country at heart and are calling it as we see it.

[...]

I reject the suggestion that banks have been foolhardy in recklessly lending and driving up values. We are in competition right across the board and I cannot think of a bank that has been reckless.

[...]

Every loan goes through a central credit committee and is properly underwritten. "
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Friday, July 3, 2009

Marie Hunt, Head of Research, CB Richard Ellis


Irish Independent, 1 June 2005

Marie Hunt, director of Research at CBRE Gunne spoke, predicted that the average price of a three-bedroom semi in Ireland will have hit €400,000 by 2015 while at that stage a similar property in Dublin is likely to cost in the order of €525,000.

BusinessWorld.ie, Jul 31 2006

"The second hand housing market is showing signs of price stablisation but some new home buyers are getting nervous because of interest rate movements. This is more indicatative of a steady transition to more stable condition than a sign of a crash or bubble bursting."

Press Release, 17 April 2007:

Property consultants CB Richard Ellis today dismissed last nights Future Shock – Property Crash’ programme, which explored the possibility of a housing market crash in Ireland over the next few years, as ‘irresponsible journalism’.

[...]

...they say that we should not be entertaining negative speculation and unfounded worst-case doom and gloom scenarios when all that is being experienced is a levelling in the extraordinary pace of growth we previously experienced. They say that last nights programme should be dismissed as fiction and that a soft landing for the Irish housing market is still possible and is the most likely scenario.

[...]

According to Marie Hunt, Director of Research at CB Richard Ellis “The property market is in simple terms a sub-set of economic activity and the fundamentals that have been driving the Irish housing market for many years now are completely unique and cannot be compared to other economies. No other country can boast the levels of economic growth that have been witnessed in Ireland in the last decade; no other country has generated the level of employment generation that Ireland has seen; no other country has seen the phenomenal population growth and levels of immigration that Ireland has witnessed and no other economy can match the decline in the average household size that has materialised in Ireland in recent years. It is simply technically incorrect to assume that that Irish house prices will decline significantly simply on the basis that this has occurred in other economies where the fundamentals were so different. It is also irresponsible to suggest that the ‘negative equity’ scenario that occurred in the late 1980’s in the UK could occur in Ireland considering that Irish lending institutions are working under the remit of the Central Bank and continue to stress-test potential borrowers to 2% above ECB rates. The sensationalist approach of last nights programme is in our view irresponsible as property is a very important issue and ultimately the general public will take the sentiments expressed last night on board when deciding whether or not to make what will essentially be the biggest financial decision of their lifetime. Would-be first time buyers who have heeded equally dramatic and incorrect predictions in the past have lost out significantly as they ‘sat on the fence’ and watched prices escalate because of the underlying fundamentals in Ireland. All we ask is that the media consider these fundamentals and adopt a balanced, informed and considered approach when dealing with such an important issue”.


Western People, October 10 2007:

Ms Hunt gave a fascinating insight into the current state of Ireland’s property industry and expressed confidence that the oft-predicted bust would not occur at any stage in the near future. While there would be a slowdown she was confident that the property sector was destined for a ‘soft landing’.

“There has been a definite slowdown in the residential sector and that was to be expected. We were never going to have a sitaution where property prices would continue to grow by up to 20 per cent per annum.

[..]

“Property will continue to appreciate but it will be at far more moderate levels and there is likely to be less investment amongst speculators in the residential property sector.
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Wednesday, July 1, 2009

Brian Cowen, Taoiseach


RTE News, 28 July 2006:

The Minister for Finance, Brian Cowen, has dismissed suggestions that the economy is too dependent on the construction sector.

Responding to new figures showing that the sector now accounts for 25% of Gross National Product, Mr Cowen said that Ireland still had a deficit in infrastructure.


Bloomberg News, 17 July 2008:

"It's important to point out that our banking system in Ireland is very well capitalised"

[...]

"It's coming off a very strong performance over the last 11, 12 years, very strong profits"

[...]

"Our governor of our Central Bank in a report this week has confirmed the healthy nature of our banking system, as I say, well capitalised.

[...]

"We don't have the exposure, any significant exposure in the sub-prime US sector, which has caused a lot of the problems originally and I think it's important to point that out.

[...]

"I think one of the issues that's been affecting market sentiment with the share price for those companies has been a perception about exposure to the construction industry, in terms of the correction that's taken place in residential housing.

[...]

"I think it's important to point out that the underlying fundamentals of the economy remain very strong and in the absence of that particular sector, we would have seen growth of 4% in the first six months.


Irish Independent, 1 July 2009:

Biffo calls the bottom!

Mr Cowen said the slump in the housing market was nearing an end. "I believe we are coming to a point this year where that will bottom out," he said.
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Monday, March 16, 2009

Tom Parlon, Director General of the Irish Construction Industry Federation, Former PD TD and Minister



With thanks to "Bigby" for collating many of these quotes)

The Right Hook Radio Show, 3 Jan 2008:

"Affordability is up 10% in the last 12 months."

(Translation: Prices are down 10% - CMcK)

Question and Answers, RTE, 7 Jan 2008:

"A 20% rise in rents proved that the demand was there for housing"

(When Matt Cooper mentioned that 1 in 6 houses is empty Tom Parlon started to talk across Matt Cooper and to interrupt systematically - CMcK)

Newstalk Breakfast Show, 11 Feb 2008:

"We're at, or very close to, the bottom now and it's turning around"

The Last Word with Matt Cooper, 11 Mar 2008:

"You'd get a good house in Dublin now for around €300k."

(Tom also dismissed the notion of 250,000 empties - CMcK)

RTE Drivetime, 17 Apr 2008:

"Our fundamentals are good."

Irish Examiner, 24 May 2008:

“A lot of buyers have been sitting on the fence for nine to 12 months, our message is now is the time to buy, there is real value out there"

[...]

"There are 1.8 million home owners in Ireland, [b]it isn’t in anyone’s interest to see house prices fall further[/b]. If negative sentiments were to disappear, people could see that there are very genuine reasons now to have confidence and buy"

The Last Word with Matt Cooper, 8 Oct 2008:

(In response to the International Monetary Fund saying that Irish house prices are most overvalued:)

"The IMF do not know what they're talking about"

Newstalk, 14 Oct 2008:

"Now we see value"

(Also repeated that he still thinks we need 40,000 homes a year.)

The Last Word with Matt Cooper, Nov 4 2008:

Tom Parlon claimed that he had never seen a ghost estate.

http://ghostestates.com/

Morning Ireland - RTE Radio 1, 28 Jan 2009:

This one deserves the largest font:

"We [in the Construction Industry Federation] saw [the crash] coming"

Speech At the Opening of the Parnell Summer School, 17 August 2003:

"Any measure giving the State the power to control the value of private assets would have major negative ramifications for thousands of property owners and would be a jump back to the dark days of the 19th century [...] Such an approach is gift-wrapped in an ideology somewhere left of Stalin"

Irish Independent, 28 October 2010:

"[My Ministerial pension is] the only bit of a pension I have and I'd like to hold on to it for as long as I can"

[...]

The former minister is completely unapologetic about using his political connections to up the odds, proudly describing how he's approached several ministers personally, including former PD colleague Mary Harney.

"I'm in and out of the Dail every other day, any chance I get ... everybody does it"

[...]

"There is not a grain of evidence that NAMA is a bailout for developers. Everything they have is being taken over, they're losing everything they have."

Is he seriously defending people's rights to live in trophy homes they can no longer afford? Isn't that a bit of a stretch?

"Certainly there was a degree of reckless spending," he admits before launching into a fervent defence of all the good developers have done.

[...]

"We've been destroyed in the CIF, my salary has close enough to halved"
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