THREE MORE banks have moved to appoint receivers to protect their loans to Liam Carroll's heavily insolvent Zoe group after Bank of Scotland (Ireland) (BoSI) and Bank of Ireland took measures to protect their loans to the group.
Allied Irish Banks (AIB), Anglo Irish Bank and KBC Bank Ireland yesterday appointed receivers over properties in the group, bringing to six the number of lenders that have taken such action to protect their loans.
Dutch-owned ACCBank, which opposed the group's two failed bids to secure court protection, was the first lender to appoint a receiver when it installed Declan Taite of accountants FGS last August to four Zoe companies.
The five other banks moved to appoint receivers after the Supreme Court's decision on Tuesday to rule out any further possibility of the group securing the appointment of an examiner to ensure its long-term survival.
AIB, the largest lender to the group, appointed accountant Billy O'Riordan of PricewaterhouseCoopers to various Zoe properties.
The bank is owed about €530 million by the group, which owes eight banks a total of €1.3 billion.
Anglo appointed accountants John McStay and Jim Luby of Dublin firm McStay Luby to take control of the bank's new headquarters which the Zoe Group was constructing on North Quay Wall in the north Dublin docklands.
The bank is owed about €40 million by the group, which borrowed the money for development work on the headquarters project. The bank agreed to provide a further €68 million to finish the project.
KBC Bank Ireland, which is owed €24 million, appointed Dublin accountant Martin Ferris receiver over parts of the group.
Ulster Bank has already taken measures to protect the security on loans totalling €87 million by moving to take control over half Mr Carroll's 29 per cent stake in food group Greencore.
The bank also has security over properties.
David Hughes of Ernst & Young and David Carson of Deloitte were appointed receivers to parts of the group by BoSI and Bank of Ireland on Thursday. BoSI is owed about €350 million and Bank of Ireland about €120 million. EBS building society is owed €9 million by Zoe.
The initial work of the receivers will focus on which lenders have security over various properties.
The domestic lenders, which account for more than half Zoe's loans, are expected to sit and hold properties until the establishment of the National Asset Management Agency (Nama), which will take ownership of the loans.
The foreign-owned banks account for about €597 million of Zoe's debts and are not covered by Nama.
Mr Taite was also appointed provisional liquidator of two companies at the apex of the group, Vantive Holdings and Morston Investments on a petition from ACC, which is owed €136 million.
A stay on the winding up of the companies remains in place until Wednesday when the Supreme Court will consider the matter.
Zoe has said it may appeal the High Court's decision last month to wind up the firms, though it may abandon this appeal following the appointment of the receivers.
A lender can appoint a receiver to a company in provisional liquidation where it has a loan charge against the firm.
A receiver has first call, before a liquidator, over any assets which it has seized.
