State has received €10.24bn from bailed out banks since collapse

The State has received €10.24 billion in various proceeds from the Irish banks that were bailed out after the financial sector collapsed in 2008 while its investments in AIB, Bank of Ireland and Permanent TSB are currently valued at €13.35 billion.

These figures have emerged from written answers from Minister for Finance Michael Noonan to questions posed recently by Michael McGrath, Fianna Fáil's finance spokesman.

With the State having provided a €64.1 billion bailout to Irish banks since 2008, this means the net cost to the taxpayer currently stands at €40.5 billion. This excludes the €450 million bank levy being applied by the Government over the next three years.

Mr Noonan said Bank of Ireland, AIB and Permanent TSB had paid €6.04 billion in various proceeds to the State since the Government bailed out the institutions. This is a mixture of the sale of equity and the redemption of various debt instruments.

In addition, the State has received €4.2 billion in fees from the two bank guarantee schemes dating back to September 30th, 2008.

According to Mr Noonan, the first proceeds were received in April 2010 when Bank of Ireland paid €491 million for the cancellation of preference share warrants. AIB paid €53 million in December of that year for the same reason.

The sale of equity shares in Bank of Ireland in August and October 2011 generated €240 million and €810 million respectively.

More than €4.4 billion was netted by the State last year. This comprised €3.11 billion from Bank of Ireland from the sale of its convertible contingent capital notes, or CoCos as they are better known, and preference shares.

The State also earned €1.34 billion from the sale of Irish Life to Canadian company Great-West Lifeco. Irish Life and PTSB were previously part of Irish Life & Permanent plc before the State gave it a €4 billion bailout.

Mr Noonan also updated Mr McGrath on the valuations of the State's investments in AIB, Bank of Ireland and PTSB. The 99.8 per cent holding in AIB is valued at €6.5 billion by the National Pensions Reserve Fund (NPRF), which manages the Government's holdings in the banks.

Notional values
This follows an independent review by Goodbody Corporate Finance, as revealed last month by The Irish Times . The residual shares in AIB trade on the Irish Stock Exchange at 14.1 pence apiece, giving it a notional market value of €73.5 billion. This is based on the share buying by retail investors and has no bearing on reality.

The preference shares in AIB held by the State are valued by the NPRF at €3.5 billion while the AIB CoCos have a redemption value of €1.6 billion.

The Government’s near 14 per cent remaining stake in Bank of Ireland is valued at €1.35 billion while the PTSB CoCos have a redemption value of €400 million.

Minister Noonan’s figures indicate that Bank of Ireland has paid €6.1 billion to the State in various payments over the past six years, while AIB (including EBS) has returned just more than €1.7 billion, almost exclusively in fees for the bank guarantees.

Bank of Ireland received a €4.7 billion bailout from the State while AIB, including the EBS building society, got €20.8 billion.

The worst return to the State on its bailout funds has unquestionably been from Irish Bank Resolution Corporation, which is is in liquidation and comprises the former Anglo Irish Bank and Irish Nationwide. IBRC received €34.7 billion from taxpayers while returning just €480 million in guarantee fees.