‘Sucked Up By The Taxpayer’

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The 17-storey Elysian Tower in Cork built by the O’Flynn Construction Group and opened in September 2008. It’s the country’s tallest building – 11 metres taller than Dublin’s Liberty Hall. It consists of 211 ‘luxury apartments’, including 37 penthouse apartments, and retail, restaurant, gym and creche facilities.

It’s being reported that the loans associated with Michael O’Flynn, of the O’Flynn Construction Group, are being sold by Nama to global investment firm Blackstone Real Estate.

The Irish Times reports:

In the absence of any information to the contrary, the taxpayers can only conclude that they have given Mr O’Flynn a very large bailout. As far as we know, Mr O’Flynn owed his banks €1.8 billion when he went into Nama in 2009 and has now left Nama owing Blackstone considerably less money – the figure of €1.1 billion being reported.

Mr O’Flynn remains, subject to contradiction by Nama, in control of his company; he just has new bankers. However, some €700 million has been wiped off his debts and sucked up by the taxpayer in one of two ways depending where the writedown took place.

If the writedown occurred when Mr O’Flynn’s loans originally transferred into Nama, the tax payer took the hit in the subsequent recapitalisation capital of the banks. If the writedown occurred when Nama sold the loans on to Blackstone, which is unlikely, the taxpayer has funded it through Nama.

O’Flynn, Blackstone case shows need for Nama openness (Irish Times)

Related: How US “vulture capitalist”, the Blackstone group is insinuating itself into the fabric of Irish state-business (Namawinelake)

Pic: Wikipedia

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