Irish banks continue to issue bonds to themselves in order to gain ECB loans!

Irish banks’ controversial issuance of ‘own-use’ bonds is set to continue. ‘Own-use’ bonds are issued by the banks to themselves, but are guaranteed by the Irish state, and then posted as collateral to take cheap loans from the ECB. In the past week Irish banks have issued €12bn of these bonds in order to roll over the original ‘own-use’ bonds until August, highlighting ongoing problems in the Irish banking sector.