US fund bets €1.9bn on Irish recovery

Gambling huge sums of money on unsafe investments may have got this country into its mess, but one US mutual funds company has bet billions that Ireland can bounce back from the brink of disaster.

After considered research by its analysts, since last summer, California-firm Franklin Templeton took the calculated $2.5bn (€1.9bn) risk to pump its clients’ money into Irish government bonds. It did so at a time when investors elsewhere in the world could not get rid of their investments fast enough.

And its confidence vote is not confined to Ireland. The firm has also placed a $3bn bet on Hungary’s recovery.