Climbing Ireland With Ricky Bell

The Adventure Journal posted an excellent video of climber Ricky Bell taking on a tough route in his home country of Ireland. The video, which I posted below, is actually a trailer for a climbing film called The Frontier Club, which will be coming out soon. The film will introduce us to some of the great climbing opportunities in Ireland. The video is a nice introduction, with some great climbing as well.


The Frontier Club Trailer from Image Impossible on Vimeo.

Humiliation

A few days ago, the Irish Times carried a story claiming that the former chief executive of Anglo Irish Bank David Drumm paid only €10,000 in income tax between 2005-08. Today, they had to retract the story. It seems he paid in excess of €6 million in income tax during his period on the bank’s board.

Yesterday The Irish Times incorrectly reported that Mr Drumm had paid only €10,000 in tax during the period. The report was based on an incorrect interpretation of a document filed by the Revenue Commissioners in a court in Boston.

Income tax returns for the period show that Mr Drumm paid income tax of €6.31 million on gross income of €12.47 million.

The effective tax rates on his income during the period ranged from 36.52 per cent in 2004, the year he was appointed to the board, to 54.1 per cent in 2008, his last year on the board.

Still, it is scandalous enough that this man earned close to €13 million working for a bank that destroyed the Irish economy.

Denmark, Australia, Anywhere

DAA Pride Barry Murphy Parody from Ciaran McCarthy on Vimeo.

All the great things about Ireland, in one short video....

The faultless logic of an Irish Anarchist

No need for comment on this chart and video

Here is the latest data for Irish bank deposits....



And here is the regulator of the Irish banking system....

Let them eat cheese

The singing is a little rough, but still funny...

From South of Dub

Ireland Gets A New Adventure Film Festival

The Explore Foundation, which is a new non-profit organization founded by Tim Lavery and Ripley Davenport, has announced a new adventure film festival for Ireland. The Killarney Adventure Film Festival, or KAFF, is scheduled to take place April 7-10, 2011 and will feature plenty of great adventure films from amateurs and professionals alike.

The organizers of the event are now looking for submissions and on the official KAFF website they have this to say about what they are looking for:

"It’s open to everyone that does weird, wacky, death-defying acts of adventure so here’s your chance to get excited and have a crack of getting your adventure film into the Hall of Fame and onto the big screen. By all accounts, who knows where this may lead to next?"

No matter what your outdoor adventure passion, you'll find a spot at KAFF. Entries can be short videos or feature length films, and can fall into a variety of categories including: Polar Adventures, Climbing Adventures, Desert Adventures, and a whole lot more. For a complete list of the categories click here and to register to submit a film, click here.

While still in the early planning stages, it seems that there are plenty of great things on tap for the first ever KAFF. The early info hints at surprise guests, screenings of some big films, and great prizes for the winners. The official website offers more info on Killarney as well, including where to stay while attending the event.

The Explore Foundation was founded in December of 2010 and has the ambitious goal of inspiring young people to see the world through a different perspective. The non-profit hopes to educate and inspire them through exploration and adventure. It seems there are some big things in the works for the organization, and we'll all just have to wait to see what is ahead. For now though, the focus is on KAFF and building a great adventure film community around that festival. Sounds like a blast!

The downfall of Biffo

How the Chinese see recent political developments in Ireland.

Say hello to the bubblemen - first up, Brian Cowen

When Brian Cowen became Irish Prime Minister in 2008, Ireland was regarded as one of the great economic success stories of the last 30 years. It had recorded stellar growth rates, sometimes reaching double digits. Her citizens grew wealthy as Ireland’s per capita GDP became among the highest in the world. Every small emerging market country wanted to be like Ireland.

From the moment that Brian stepped up to the top job, things started to fall apart. The financial crisis kicked off in September 2008, and threatened to take down the Irish banking system. As Lehman's bankruptcy papers were heading to a New York Court, Irish bank depositors became nervous. Brian prevented a run on the banks by offering a blanket state guarantee on all bank deposits. The generosity of that offer forced the rest of Europe to follow.

The guarantee provided only temporary relief. The crisis exposed Ireland’s over dependence on the property market. Despite the bank guarantee, a string of Irish banks failed, leading to one of the most catastrophic declines in output ever experienced by an industrialized economy. Government debt exploded, while the financial system imploded. Unemployment is rising, the housing market is crashing, and the government deficit is as wide as the Irish Sea.

His party will almost certainly be destroyed as soon as he calls an election. Rather than face the ignominy of a wipeout at the ballot box, many of his cabinet colleagues are throwing in the towel, and quietly going into retirement. Few politicians have ever experienced the reversal that poor Brian has faced. But how much of this calamity is the responsibility of poor Brian?

Unfortunately, he doesn't have a strong defence. He was a permanent feature of the Irish cabinet since the early 1990s. He was finance minister from 2004-2008.

He could argue that since 1999 the Irish state was no longer responsible for monetary policy and the years of excessively low interest rates that that fuelled the Irish bubble. That task had been delegated the ECB. But it was the Euro that did in Ireland. It was the single currency that created the conditions for the huge rise in property values, and a decade of grossly irresponsible banking. It was Brian and his Cabinet colleagues who are responsible for lumbering Ireland with the Euro.

Brian is the first of our bubble men - the villains that fashioned the great financial catastrophe of our age.

Why the Eurozone is not an optimal currency area

What should the ECB do? Should it increase interest rates or leave them where they are?

The property market in Vienna strongly suggests that it is time for a rate increase. Home prices in the Austrian capital jumped 10 percent this year. Property price inflation is outstripping income growth; a sure sign of a bubble. Viennese property speculators need a slap in the face to bring them back to reality. Only a hefty rate hike can do that.

Dublin, on the other hand, is a housing market Chernobyl. Prices in the Irish capital are down 22 percent this year and almost 50 percent since the property bubble peak.. Here the situation is quite different. Everyone in Ireland apart from the parish priest is on a Euro-tracker mortgage. Somewhat surprisingly, Irish mortgage holders have continued to service their debts. The mortgage default rates is comparatively low. A rate hike would probably push many homeowners over the edge. This could generate a further round of banking losses.

More generally, inflation rates across Europe are picking up. The post-crisis surge of liquidity is feeding through into the real economy. Unfortunately, the Eurozone is travelling down two quite separate tracks, as the housing market of Dublin and Vienna amply demonstrate.

Rock? Hard place?

Run, Fat Boy, Run

A few short years ago, Michael " Fingers" Fingleton was CEO of the Irish Nationwide Building Society. Today, he spends his time dodging reporters in airports.

Unfortunately, Fingers has been the victim of dubious accusations by former employees of the bank.

• Olivia Greene, a former loans supervisor, claimed that the bank gave the former Irish finance minister Charlie McCreevy €1.6 million to buy a €1.5 million property. By my calculation, that loan is in excess of 100 percent of the property value. Fingers was a first-rate banker. I am sure he would have never authorised such a loan.
• I cannot believe that he gave a loan to Celia Larkin the ex-partner of the former Irish prime minister Bertie Ahern without requiring any proof of income.
• Equally, I find it totally implausible that Fingers would have countenanced giving loans to John Mara, the son of Fianna Fail Director of Elections. Apparently court documents say that young John received a loan amounting to €1.5 million without any collateral. Surely the Irish courts are mistaken?
• Is it possible that Fingers fast tracked loans amounting to €7 million and €3 million to two Fianna Fail politicians? I don't believe it.

Nor can I believe that Fingers was in any way responsible for the appalling losses of Irish nationwide. In 2008, the institution made a pre-tax loss of €280 million. It had to write off loans amounting to €464 million. In 2009, it made further losses of €2.5 billion, wiping out all the profits the bank made inception as Irish Nationwide.

Eventually, the Irish state had to inject €3 billion into the bank to prevent it from collapsing. It is inconceivable that these losses or the bailout had anything to do with Fingers.

Churlishly, as Fingers was retiring after nearly 4 decades of selfless service to Irish Nationwide, the government wanted him to repay a €1 million bonus. As a consequence, this poor man suffered the indignity of reporter chasing him around Dublin airport asking him to pay the money back.

So farewell then Fingers. The Irish financial system will miss you. Enjoy your retirement. You deserve it.

Ireland and her growing fiscal deficit

In the late 1990s Ireland was one of the most fiscally prudent countries in Europe. It regularly recorded budget surpluses.

However, no one was watching over the banks. Throughout the last decade, Ireland's financial sector made appalling loans to property speculators and other folk of an unsavoury nature. Now, those loans can not be paid back.

Rather than passing losses onto the bank's creditors, who foolishly financed this farrago, the Irish Government decided to place the burden for paying for this disgraceful speculation on the poor taxpayer.  While the government is raising taxes, cutting services and reducing the public sector salaries, it is also taking on defaulted loans so that French and German banks don't have to reduce their dividends to their shareholders. If a government runs that kind of economic policy, it will quickly accumulate a 32 percent of GDP budget deficit.

Ironically, Ireland's mortgage holders continue to service their debts. Arrears are running at about 5 percent. That is a little higher than the UK, but given that the Irish economy has imploded, it is surprising that the default rate hasn't risen higher.

How the Chinese see the Irish crisis

Racial stereotyping - Chinese style.

Making things worse

The Irish “rescue package” finalized over the weekend is a disaster. You can say one thing for the European Commission, the ECB and the German government: they never miss an opportunity to make things worse.

Barry Eichengreen on the Irish bailout.

Read the whole thing here....

Irish deficit hits 32 percent of GDP

It is not news, I know. However,the Irish government has published its pre budget white paper. Although the 32 percent of GDP deficit number has been around for a month or so, it is still shocking to see the sorry story of Ireland's collapse in a few cold data tables.

This year, the Irish government expects to collect €36 billion and spend €54 billion, leaving a deficit of around €18 billion. The banking sector clean up added a further €32 billion to the deficit. That is around €7,100 euros per person.  The combined effect of a large deficit and a massive financial sector clean up added  €50 billion.  That is equivalent to one year of government expenditure.

This isn't the whole cost of the clean up.  There were a few earlier cash injections into the banks that the Irish taxpayer will have to cover. However, I don't have those numbers with me. Nevertheless, we can all feel suffiicently enraged by the  €7,100 figure that was accumulated just this year.

Does this look like a sensible, coherent and thought out policy?

Or does it look like panic? The MPC must have lost its collective mind, cutting the bank rate to almost zero.

You know a country is in trouble when.....

....its ministry of finance produces a statement like this....

An Exchequer deficit of €3,721 million was recorded in the first quarter of 2009 compared to a deficit of €354 million in the same period last year. Tax revenue was down year-on-year by €2.6 billion or 23%. Total net voted expenditure was just over €680 million or 6% above expenditure levels for the same period of last year.

A ten-fold increase in the fiscal deficit; tax revenues are down almost a quarter; while expenditures are up 6 percent.

The country? Ireland.

Irish unemployment - highest for 12 years

After enjoying over a decade of extraordinary economic growth, Irish unemployment has exploded. In March, the rate hit 11 percent of the workforce.