In Focus: Allied Irish Banks

Finance Minister Michael Noonan and the Government’s banking market advisers will have to show their hand very soon, if they are to sell up to €3bn of shares in AIB in May or June.

The timing of any IPO and the price that investors will be prepared to pay for a 25% stake in the bank loom large as AIB releases its full-year earnings this week.

Minister Noonan in late January surprised many watchers when he said that if market conditions allow that early summer was the first window of opportunity for the return of a chunk of AIB to private hands.