Cost of borrowing hits record 9.25%

THE cost of borrowing for the country continues to hit record highs, peaking at 9.25% yesterday, despite pledges of support from Europe.

As the crisis deepened Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz, a former chief economist with the World Bank, said Ireland is in a “dismal” position and declared there is little chance that the Government’s measures to reduce the budget and bail out the banks will be a success.

“The austerity measures are weakening the economy, their approach to bank resolution is disappointing,” the Columbia University economics professor said in a Bloomberg Television interview in Hong Kong yesterday.