by Ronan Coburn | Feb 7, 2019 | Tracker Mortgages' Scandal
Tracker Redress Cases’ Update 2019 Aggregate Tracker Redress & Compensation is hurtling towards 1 billion Euro. The Central Bank of Ireland generated this artful Infographic Central Bank Tracker Redress Feb 2019 update . The highlights of which are: 39,800 borrowers have been impacted under Tracker Redress since 2015. Tracker Redress to Dec 2018 is Euro649 million. 15 Irish Banks or banking groups implicated culminating in setting in place of a formal scheme for Tracker Redress. There is a Regulatory scheme in place whereby the culpable banks must pay, inter alia (a) Compensation, (b) redress, and (c) recognition of the Time Value of Money, (d) demonstrable consequential losses, (e) medical costs with respect to distress . Sums offered by way of redress to date can be accepted without compromising future pursuit options. Therefore affected Borrowers may continue actions through (i) Appeals to allegedly Independent Appeals’ panels, (ii) Financial Services & Pensions Ombudsman and/or (iii) the Courts. In addition to (A) returning the Present Value of their own money back to Borrowers, all offending Banks must (B) recognize valid entitlements to incremental evidenced Consequential Losses (indirect but attributable costs) and financial estimations of negative qualitative consequences. Allegedly independent overseers of the various Tracker Redress schemes are EY., Grant Thornton, KPMG, Mazars, PWC & Deloitte. Central Bank Operations: A number of Irish lenders under investigation by the Central Bank in relation to the State’s €1 billion tracker mortgage scandal will be sanctioned with multi-million euro fines later this year. There is uncertainty on how many of the cases involving the six mortgage lenders, (including AIB and its EBS subsidiary, Bank of Ireland, Permanent...
by Ronan Coburn | Jul 24, 2017 | Topical in Irish Banking Sector, Tracker Mortgages' Scandal
The primary function of an Expert Witness in Ireland is to assist the Irish courts in matters within his/her sphere of specialist expertise. The retention of an Expert Witness in Ireland is a common feature of litigation. As in most cases [where they are former-Legal Practitioners], Judges are typically well-qualified to adjudicate on allegations of legal negligence without additional aid from an expert. Where an Expert Witness is being retained, there is an obligation on Instructing Solicitors to ensure that the costs of litigation are proportionate. Expert Witness in Ireland – liability There is now a possibility that Expert witnesses can be subject to claims in negligence arising from failure to exercise reasonable skill and care in providing their Expert Evidence. The courts in Ireland have held that an Expert in Ireland will have discharged his/her duty to their client if they provide an independent and unbiased opinion, which is within the range of ‘reasonable expert opinions’. Therefore, experts who have proactively and mindfully engaged in the process of presenting expert evidence are likely to satisfy these criteria vis-à-vis their liability. Expert Witness in Ireland – Immunity Expert Witness in Ireland immunity has been upheld in a number of recent Irish precedent cases. One of the leading cases – Looney v the Governor and the Company of Bank of Ireland & Morey – provided that a Court could suspend an Expert Witness’s immunity if the witness was found to have made defamatory (or malicious) statements. In a UK case in 2015, one reason cited for abolishing expert witness immunity was the public policy argument that Experts should be accountable...
by Ronan Coburn | May 7, 2017 | Topical in Irish Banking Sector, Tracker Mortgages' Scandal
AIB Belfry cases progressing in Court Approximately 300 investors in AIB Belfry cases (out of an estimated 3000 investors in the six Funds) are pursuing damages for alleged negligence, breach of contract, breach of fiduciary duty, negligent mismanagement and misrepresentation by AIB and other parties. Last month the Irish Times reporting on AIB Belfry cases (in a preliminary ruling in April 2017) a High Court judge approved hundreds of damages actions by investors in the Belfry property funds to go to a full trial on some, but not all, of the grounds advanced. The Court found, while some elements of the claims are statue-barred, other parts of the claims can now proceed to trial. The claims involve the operation of five separate investment funds into commercial property in the UK known as “the AIB Belfry Funds”. Affidavits claim individuals invested sums of between €50,000 and €200,000 in the funds between 2002 and 2006. Some cases involved individuals’ life savings to have been designated as pension funds. Seemingly the Statute of Limitations may not protect the various classes of Defendants if fraud in the mis-selling & operation of the AIB Belfry Funds can be evidenced. Loan to Value covenants In his preliminary ruling after 11-months, Judge Haughton decided on 28th April 2017 crucially, the investors’ contentions of alleged failure to advise them about aspects of the funds known as a loan-to-value (LTV) covenant before they invested are not statue-barred. It is claimed these covenants permitted assets which the fund had invested in to be sold if their value fell below a certain amount. These asset sales, it is claimed, occurred...
by Ronan Coburn | May 3, 2017 | Tracker Mortgages' Scandal
First of two Tracker Redress Flaws A Conflict of Interest is something that potentially haunts members of the Professions in all democracies. On the Web Site of KPMG., (authors of PermTSB’s Tracker Redress Scheme) reference is made to a recent Wall Street Journal article1 and public comments by the Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) Director of the Office of Compliance Inspections and Examinations, 2 the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) and the SEC are “keenly focused on conflicts of interest” for firms in the financial services sector. Further emphasizing the importance of managing conflicts of interest (COIs), SEC Director di Florio stated that “conflicts of interest, when not eliminated or properly mitigated, are a leading indicator of significant regulatory issues for individual firms, and sometimes even systematic risk for the entire financial system.” A recent Sunday Times article disclosed that KPMG were paid €8.6m by Permanent TSB in 2015 for work on the state-controlled bank’s Tracker Mortgage Redress Scheme [TMRS] and other “regulatory and compliance projects”. The payment, equivalent to a substantial 3% of the accountancy firm’s all-Ireland fee income [of about €300m a year], provides the first glimpse of how a Tracker Redress Flaws scandal will cost Irish lenders millions in fees, on top of the interest refunds and compensation they will have to pay to impacted customers. Second of two Tracker Redress Flaws The emerging Tracker Redress Flaws scandal, is rooted in the unfair removal of low-cost tracker mortgages from thousands of home owners, is also interfering with the banks’ ability to securitise, or offload mortgages as they seek to sanitise their balance sheets. Approximately 90 of...
by Ronan Coburn | Apr 10, 2017 | Topical in Irish Banking Sector, Tracker Mortgages' Scandal
Ulster Bank GRG seeking some type of self-redemption Late last year Ulster Bank GRG [the Bank’s – now disbanded Global Recovery Group], produced a 3-year delayed response to the Tomlinson Report into RBS & its subsidiaries (2013) lawrence Tomlinson Report into operations of RBS The Irish Times reported [ Ulster Bank GRG notice to Irish borrowers] on the establishment of a compensation Scheme whereby €450M was being made available by way of a dispute appeal reserve. Eligible individuals & businesses must first of all meet the following criteria (A) not have previously referred their Dispute to the Financial Services Ombudsman, and (B) not engaged in Litigation or pre-litigation communications with the Bank. Very recently Ulster Bank GRG made direct contact with a number of potentially qualifying Borrowers, with quite an obscure account of how the Scheme will operate. It only relates to certain ‘complex fees’ as applied by Ulster Bank GRG from 2008 to 2013. Under the very narrowly defined scheme such ‘Complex Fees’ disregard Irish Interest Rate Hedging Products’ miselling. Additionally the Scheme bypasses any recognition of the understated role of Consequential Losses (or chain-reaction/ cause & affect losses). A salient precedent case on this topic is Hadley versus Baxendale (1854), beloved by many Law Students over the previous Century-and-a-half. In an appearance of Senior Ulster Bank Executives before the Oireachtas Finance Committee in December 2016, the following was put to Andrew Blair (Head of Problem Debt Management – Ulster Bank), by Pearse Doherty (TD Sinn Fein). “Businesses believed they would be supported but, as was put to me, they were not aware that they were being put...
by Ronan Coburn | Jan 5, 2017 | Topical in Irish Banking Sector, Tracker Mortgages' Scandal
Bank of Ireland Tracker Mortgage compensation being faced-up to as Movable Feast . Last month (first quarter 2017) 15-Banking Groups have owned-up to having to redress in excess of 15,000 Borrowers through a series of Tracker Mortgage compensation schemes. See also Fintan O’Toole on Banks getting away with fraud . There is now a likelihood that the Regulator will impose additional separate financial sanctions on the offending Banks (in the Regulator’s industry-wide review). The Banks’ euphemism of ‘falling short of their contractual obligations’ is an opaque reference to affected Borrowers’ being denied of their rightful opportunity to switch back from fixed Rates to tracker rates over 9-years ago. BoI is the last of the Irish Banks to set up a Tracker Mortgage compensation scheme – now apparently operational since early 2017. The 15,000 Mortgage borrowers who were impacted, represent an aggregated overcharge value of €500M over the mortgages’ lifespan. A Tracker Mortgage compensation scheme typically allows a sum [in the region of €500] for Independent Professional Advice per case, clearly based on the thesis ‘ask me no questions and I’ll tell you no lies’. Central Bank recommend Indep Legal Advice on Redress Offers BoI’s latest disclosures are suspect in so far as they represent a new (& previously unheralded phase-2 Tracker Mortgage compensation) whereby some 7-years ago, in 2010 it previously restored 2100 of its own customer accounts back on to tracker rates. In December 2016, the Central Bank, confirmed that, to date approximately 100 houses have been repossessed by Irish Mortgagee Banks as a ’cause & effect’ of having been denied the right to have obtained substantially lower tracker mortgage...
