It’s been a while since the Victorian historian, Thomas Carlyle, described economics as the dismal science, but, even so, the discipline and its practitioners’ predictions have more influence than they did in Carlyle’s time.

YESTERDAY’S warning from the State’s debt agency the National Treasury Management Agency (NTMA) was a sobering reality check.

Ireland is still paying a higher interest rate on national debt than Greece, Italy, and Spain, despite claims that years of austerity measures have left the country in a better position than other recession-hit nations.

Finance Minister Michael Noonan has said that the country can afford to pay the EU an additional €280m, after the CSO said economic growth had soared by over 26% last year.

Ireland doesn’t need to jump in to tap sovereign debt markets even as yields have tumbled following the shock decision of the UK to leave the EU, the head of the National Treasury Management Agency has said.

The chief of the National Treasury Management Agency (NTMA) has hailed a turnaround in the fortunes of the State’s creditworthiness.

Michael Noonan appears to have ruled out selling down an initial stake in AIB to stock markets until after the election.

The Government has increased the value of its 99.8% stake in AIB from €11.6bn at the end of 2013 to €13.3bn at the end of last year, according to the NTMA’s annual statement.

Jason Lynch will again attempt to thwart the ambitions of his childhood club when his Lisnagarvey side host Cork C of I in the Irish Senior Cup tomorrow (2.45pm).

The NTMA will seek to raise a further €3bn-€4bn as early as today as it moves to refinance the remaining €9.5bn of IMF loans.

Conor O’Kelly, outgoing president Munster Branch of the Irish Hockey Association (MBIHA), has warned the province cannot afford to neglect the running of the game after it took two meetings to elect new management.

Investec has agreed to buy Irish unlisted broker and wealth manager NCB for €32 million as part of the South African bank’s strategy to cut its reliance on traditional lending.

Investec, the international specialist bank and asset manager, has bought NCB, one of Ireland’s leading financial services groups, for €32.3m.

NCB Stockbrokers made an after-tax loss of €77,000 last year, compared to a profit of €615,000 in 2008.

THE directors of NCB Stockbrokers paid themselves more than €2 million last year as the firm swung back into profit.

BRIL (Business Reporting Ireland Limited), the company formed to promote the use of extensible Business Reporting Language in Ireland has recruited three new member organisations to its fold.