Banks have enough cash for now, says Honohan

The governor of the Central Bank Patrick Honohan has said the banks are adequately funded and there was no immediate need for further recapitalisation of the sector.

Mr Honohan was speaking at the publication of the Central Bank’s 2011 annual report and was responding to a reference to a report — published last week by Deutsche Bank — speculating that Irish banks might need between €2bn and €4bn in extra funding, which could lead to the country requiring a second bailout.

The Central Bank is set to carry out another round of stress tests on domestic banks in 2013 and, while Mr Honohan said there were “a lot of issues for bank capital in the years ahead”, he claimed that there was “no immediate need for extra capital for the banks”.