M&T record earnings of €285m
Earlier this month, AIB completed the sale to M&T of its troublesome US subsidiary Allfirst Financial Inc. for about $3.1 billion in stock and cash leaving AIB with a 22.5% holding in M&T and a €450m war chest to complete a share buy back programme. AIB has already bought back more that €140m in shares in the last week.
Merrion stockbrokers banking analyst, Elaine Brownlee, said M&T’s results and, more importantly, the fact that M&T did not change its guidance on earnings going forward in a troubled US economy underpins the strength of the decision of AIB to offload Allfirst to M&T, while retaining a very significant portion of the enlarged business.
