ANGLO IRISH Bank took out a charge on a significant percentage of the Quinn Group's shares at around the time that Seán Quinn and his family were purchasing a stake in the bank equal to almost 15 per cent of its value.
The charge was registered through Quinn Quarries Ltd, a company 100 per cent owned by Seán Quinn jnr and not part of the Quinn Group.
A spokesman for Mr Quinn had no comment to make on the matter. A spokesman for Anglo Irish said it was not the bank's practice to comment on customers' or shareholders' affairs.
Last week, the Quinn Group announced that it was writing down €829 million in loans it had made in 2007 to companies outside the group that had in turn made investments on behalf of Quinn family members.
A large amount of this money is understood to have been lost by way of investments in Anglo Irish shares implemented through contracts for difference (CFDs).
CFDs are leveraged share investments through which an investor can make significant profits if the shares increase in value. However, the size of the losses incurred if the share price drops can be a multiple of the losses that would arise if the shares had simply been purchased.
The charge taken out on July 9th, 2008, by Anglo Irish Bank was on 86,200 A ordinary shares and 200 redeemable preference shares in Quinn Group (RoI) Ltd, the holding company for the Quinn Group.
The A ordinary shares charged equal 17.7 per cent of the company's 486,398 issued A ordinary shares. The 200 preference shares are the entirety of that category of share. The company also has 982,565 issued B ordinary shares.
The preference shares give their holder the right to appoint a majority of the board of Quinn Group (RoI) Ltd.
The holding company owns subsidiaries that control insurance businesses Quinn Healthcare and Quinn Direct, as well as the Quinn concrete and quarrying operations, property interests, and glass, radiator and plastics manufacturing businesses.
On July 15th, a spokesman for the Quinn Group issued a statement saying that the family "announced today that they are in the process of unwinding their interests held in Anglo Irish Bank through contracts for difference and, as part of this process, individual family members are purchasing long holdings in the bank's ordinary shares, which will represent close to 15 per cent of Anglo Irish Bank's ordinary share capital."
Commenting on the move, the chairman of Quinn Group, Seán Quinn, said: "The family regards these shareholdings in Anglo Irish Bank as long-term holdings with significant opportunity for capital growth over such a period."
Mr Quinn resigned from the board of Quinn Insurance, the holding company for Quinn Healthcare and Quinn Direct, after the company was fined €3.25 million by the Irish Financial Services Regulatory Authority for not notifying it of loans totalling €288 million advanced by the company in the period to May of this year.
In a statement earlier this week, a spokesman for the group said that the loans supported investments made outside of the group during 2008.
"The security [on the loans] has been restructured and the majority of the loans have now been repaid," he said.
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