Seen or heard: Weekend digest

Dunnes Stores is preparing to move into online retailing and has already begun to hire staff for the venture, according to the Sunday Business Post.

Plans for the operation are already at an advanced stage and the group has “begun sounding out potential key staff who are currently working for several online retailers based in Ireland”, the paper reported.

The focus will be on groceries and will offer a substantial range of products. The move will pit Dunnes directly against Tesco, which has 28 per cent of the Irish market as against Dunnes’s

23 per cent, according to the paper.

Dunnes, which is controlled by the children of its founder Ben Dunne snr, did not comment for the article.

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The Sunday Times reports that Brian Hayes, the junior finance minister, met Yuriy Kolobov, Ukraine’s finance minister, in Kiev last Friday to enlist support for the efforts of the Irish Bank Resolution Corporation to secure control of Seán Quinn’s Ukrainian assets.

The bank’s attempts to take control of a €600 million shopping centre and a €70 million business centre in Kiev have been frustrated by legal moves by third parties in e Ukraine.

Mr Hayes described the meeting as constructive.

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NTR will retain control of Greenstar, the State’s biggest waste operator, having struck a deal with its banks, according to the Sunday Times.

The paper reports that the banks have agreed to write down half of Greenstar’s €90 million debt following a failed attempt to offload the company to US private equity group Gores which entered into exclusive negotiations last March.

Bank of Ireland, Bank of Scotland and Ulster Bank are among the syndicate of seven banks writing down their debts.