A time for taxpayers to win some and lose a lot

WINNER AND LOSERS: It was a year of mixed fortunes with unlucky winners and fortuitous losers, writes Edward Power.

Winners and losers? If only it was so straightforward. This was a year of bittersweet triumphs and eleventh-hour reversals, a year when ironclad certainties wilted in the face of mounting economic turmoil and a generation of Celtic Tiger posterboys (and gals) felt the icy waters of recession lap at their ankles.

Chief among 2002's crop of winners were, arguably, the taxpayers - or at least those who signed up for the Government's controversial special savings incentive scheme. The Minister for Finance, Mr McCreevy's, pet project touted a once-in-a lifetime deal: a guaranteed 25 per cent margin on your investment.

Cynics noted that the endeavour arrived mere weeks before a General Election in which the Government returned to office with minimum fuss - Opposition politicians accused Mr McCreevy of practically bribing the electorate - but most of us were too busy calculating the killing we were set to score to pay heed to the whingers.

As the fraught state of the public finances became increasingly apparent, however, many wondered whether Mr McCreevy's imaginative deployment of Exchequer funds might not have been a tad ill-judged.

With millions of euros accruing interest in special savings accounts, one could argue that taxpayers should count among the year's most conspicuous losers, for it is they, rather than Mr McCreevy, who will be required to foot the generous mark-up due to special savings investors.

An incontrovertible winner was cardboard magnate Dr Michael Smurfit who scooped an estimated €200 million windfall from the sale of the Smurfit group to US venture capitalists Madison Dearborn Partners. With the Ryder Cup pledged to his beloved K-Club in 2006, Dr Smurfit looks to the future with relish.

Just weeks ago, Ryanair's combative chief executive Mr Michael O'Leary would have been a shoo-in to join Dr Smurfit on the victor's podium as the budget carrier posted record turnover and unprecedented passenger numbers.

Of late, it's all turned sour for Mr O'Leary unfortunately: the EU is investigating whether concessions obtained at Ryanair's Charleroi hub were granted illicitly and British rivals EasyJet threatens to eclipse it as Europe's largest cut-price airline.

Still, no matter how severe the treatment meted out by Brussels, Mr O'Leary is unlikely to find himself in a predicament as unfortunate as that suffered by Mr Tom Lynch and Mr Donal Geaney, who stepped down as director and chairman of pharmaceuticals company Elan, after a Wall Street Journal article cast doubt on its accounting practices, precipating a share price collapse.

The Journal story might once have elicited a collective shrug on the stock market floor. Following the demise of Enron, the Texas oil giant laid low by boardroom skulduggery, the allegations pulled a metaphorical rug from under Elan. Almost overnight, the firm crumpled in value - hitting Mr Lynch and Mr Geaney for stakehold losses estimated at €30 million and €40 million respectively.

Still, at least Elan's core activities remain buoyant. As long as people suffer migraine, come down with flu and break out in acne at the most inconvenient moments, the pharmaceuticals sector will ship product.

Pity those former high-fliers of the information technology industry who have in contrast struggled to keep their necks above the waterline while the industry sinks deeper into the mire.

With no end in sight to the IT bottom-out , former high-tech darling Baltimore Technologies posted pre-tax losses of €69 million for the first six months of 2002 and jettisoned over half its workforce.

Similar woes afflicted Dublin e-learning provider SmartForce. Once the world leader in its niche, the Dublin company merged with US rival SkillSoft and promptly shed a third of its share price amid reports that it had overstated results for three years.

Sounding a rare note of triumph amid the discord was Dún Laoghaire computer security firm Priority Data, acquired by Dutch group Unit 4 Agresso for a rumoured €15 million. After 10 years in the business, founder Mr Alex Florence has retired to the distinctly lo-tech reaches of north Monaghan.

It is difficult to judge whether millionaire solicitor Mr Noel Smyth rates as an unlucky winner or fortuitous loser. Mr Smyth's audacious bid to wrest control of property developer Dunloe Ewart ran aground and he sold his stakehold to Bord na gCon chairman Mr Paschal Taggart. One suspects that the €46 million Mr Smyth pocketed from the transaction went some way towards sating his stifled ambitions.

Rather less rewarding but alas all too typical was the fate visited upon former Taoiseach Mr Albert Reynolds, who departed the board of exploration firm Bula Resources under an angry cloud.

Mr Reynolds chose not to seek re-election as a non-executive director as vitriolic shareholders accused him of failing to wield fully his influence on Bula's behalf. Mr Reynolds pointed out that he did not hold an executive position but investors gave short shrift to his pleas.

Such was the rancour from the floor that Mr Reynolds decided to bow out gracefully. Even as his business profile dimmed, however, he regained the moral high ground in the political sphere, revealing that he had informed current Taoiseach Mr Bertie Ahern of rumours surrounding corrupt Fianna Fáil TD Mr Ray Burke before the North Dublin deputies's reappointment to Cabinet in 1997.

It is tempting but quite pointless to affix a loser's tag on John Rusnak, the AIB "brogue trader" - thank you Baltimore Sun - who notched up a $691.2 million debt from his desk at the bank's US All First subsidiary. Rusnak begins a four-year jail term next year - but more grievous long term damage was arguably inflicted upon the board of AIB, which faced uncomfortable questions over the extent (or lack) of control it exerted over its overseas divisions. Bank of Ireland couldn't afford to sneer - its attempted takeover of Abbey National, the British building society, culminated in a humiliating rebuff.

Losers, it will be noted, conspicuously outnumbered winners this year. No coincidence that. If the late 1990s was the heyday of the underdog - when any plucky aspirant with a natty idea and enough chutzpah to raise the funding had a shot at the big time - then 2002 was the year the establishment reaffirmed its stranglehold on the world of high finance as venture capitalists ran scared and fund managers mixed caution with outright suspicion.

But, of course, the real story of the year was the economy which, wheeze and splutter as it might, failed to shrug off the hangover that descended sometime between the dotcom implosion and the start of Washington's war on terror.

With unemployment surging past four per cent, inflation running at twice the euro-zone average and foreign investment slowing to a trickle, it is becoming increasingly apparent who the real losers are this year.

The losers are us.