NAMA gets backing of investment chief

Dublin: The National Asset Management Agency is causing divisions among Ireland’s investment community.

The Irish Association of Investment Managers (IAIM) chairman Gerry Keenan said: “NAMA of course is the issue that provokes most division and debate, even among members of this association.

“I know that some of our members strongly disagree with the concept of the taxpayer coming to the support of failed banking enterprises, while others welcome the initiative as a painful precursor to economic recovery.

“I regard NAMA in that latter light. It has achieved a reasonable balance between the need to support a very fragile banking system on the one hand and the need to protect the taxpayer to the greatest degree possible on the other,” he added.