Anglo Irish Liquidator Seeks to Sell $19 Billion in Loans
Irish Bank Resolution Corp., formed to complete the liquidation of Anglo Irish Bank Corp., asked a U.S. bankruptcy judge to approve the sale of loans with nominal balances totaling more than $19 billion.
The proposed purchasers of the U.S. assets include affiliates of Goldman Sachs Group Inc., Deutsche Bank AG (DBK) and Lone Star Funds, according to an April 22 filing by the liquidator of the nationalized lender in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Wilmington, Delaware.
Ireland’s government seized the Dublin-based bank in January 2009 as its bad loans soared following the collapse of the nation’s real-estate market. IBRC filed for creditor protection in Delaware in August to protect its U.S. holdings during the wind-down.
The liquidator, Kieran Wallace, asked the judge to consider approving the loan sales at a May 13 hearing.
Ireland’s government put the nationalized lender, Irish Bank Resolution Corp., into liquidation in February last year under a plan to restructure its 34.7 billion-euro ($46.3 billion) bailout. The previous administration gave the bank through 2020 to wind down.
Anglo Irish was nationalized in 2009 amid the country’s financial crisis and has cost taxpayers 29.3 billion euros. The near-collapse of the country’s banking system forced Ireland to take an international bailout and prompted governments to introduce some of the harshest austerity measures in Europe.
The case is In re Irish Bank Resolution Corp. Ltd., 13-12159, U.S. Bankruptcy Court, District of Delaware (Wilmington).
(By Edvard Pettersson)
Source: bloomberg
