Little impact in Ireland from Fortis and Hypo Real Estate rescue

THERE will be no impact in Ireland from the fall of Fortis and Hypo Real Estate, despite both banks having a significant presence here.

Fortis is a partner in Postbank, the non-credit bank operated through the country’s post offices, while German bank Hypo has substantial operations in Dublin.

News broke yesterday of a government bailout of financial giant Fortis by the Belgian, Dutch and Luxembourg governments and the granting of a multi-billion euro credit line to German bank Hypo Real Estate from a consortium of German banks.

A statement released by Fortis yesterday said: “The current speculation regarding Fortis does not effect Postbank as it is an independently managed and independently funded financial institution that has no exposure to current market turmoil.”

Postbank does not offer credit facilities to its customers in Ireland.

Government officials from the three Benelux countries hammered out a €1.2 billion plan to partially nationalise Fortis over the weekend after the it failed to dispel liquidity concerns.

A spokeswoman for An Post also said: “Trading is very solid in Postbank at the moment.”

She added that the turmoil in financial markets in recent weeks had actually seen a surge of customers to Postbank services.

In Britain, authorities also announced that they were nationalising troubled buy-to-let lender Bradford and Bingley.