Final bill for bailing out banks could hit €100bn

IRELAND’S final bill for bailing out its banks may be €90 billion to €100 billion because property prices “most certainly” haven’t reached a bottom, said Morgan Kelly, an economist at University College Dublin.

Ireland, which has already injected €62bn into its lenders, may see its government debt rise to €240bn to €250bn as a result, Kelly said in Kilkenny at the weekend.

“We are very far from the bottom” of the real-estate market, he said, and it will take a decade for the economy to recover.