Dublin-based bank’s Russian exposure, car insurance premiums drop, and ensuring your home is not underinsured

The most exposed Irish-based bank to Russia, Intesa Sanpaolo Bank Ireland, plunged to a €166.8 million pretax loss last year, driven by loan impairment charges as it downgraded the creditworthiness of Russian corporate borrowers amid the war in Ukraine. Joe Brennan reports.

The price of motor insurance has continued to fall with premiums costing 5 per cent less in the first half of 2022 compared with 2021 prices, according to a new report from the Central Bank of Ireland. Conor Pope has the details.

Sticking with motor insurance, Conor Pope also reports on how uninsured or untraced drivers are involved in almost 40 incidents each week with more than 10,000 claims lodged with the Motor Insurers’ Bureau of Ireland since 2018.

Legal & General Investment Management, one of the world’s biggest asset managers, actively voted against executive pay packets at Irish companies CRH, Greencore and Flutter last year, the group’s latest “active ownership” report states. Eoin Burke-Kennedy has the details.

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Is your home underinsured? Many homeowners have been told just that by their insurer recently. Fiona Reddan explains why in our weekly personal finance feature, and suggests some ways to ensure you are not caught out by clauses in your policy.

In our personal finance Q&A, a reader who is joint executor of her late mother’s will wonders if they have to wait until her house is sold before distributing the existing cash assets. And if they have to wait, can they get repayment of expenses so far incurred? Dominic Coyle offers some guidance. If you want more personal finance coverage you can sign up to our On The Money newsletter, published every Friday, here.

The pressure continues to mount on Ires Reit, the country’s largest private landlord, with activist investor Vision Consulting issuing another public letter to fellow shareholders, urging change at the Irish listed company. Will Ires be able to count on its Canadian founder for support? Cantillon offers a view.

Twitter is an extraordinary circus, an accelerated destruction of one man’s wealth and a social media endgame all in one, writes our columnist Laura Slattery.

The cost of agricultural land in Ireland is forecast to rise by a further 8 per cent this year on the back of constrained supply and higher demand from the dairy sector due to new environmental regulations, according to a new report by State farming agency Teagasc and the Society of Chartered Surveyors Ireland. Eoin Burke-Kennedy has the details.

Deluxe Group, the Co Armagh-based interior fit-out specialist behind the Game of Thrones studio tour, has announced plans to double its workshop capacity with an investment of €1.69 million and open a new facility in Florida amid a boom in global experience economy. Ian Curran reports.

In Me & My Money, Geraldine Magnier, co-founder and director of customer analytics firm Idiro Analytics, tells Tony Clayton-Lea that she likes to support buskers “who add so much culture and beauty to our streets”.

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