A selection of today's other business stories in brief
EBS considers selling to stem losses
EBS, the building society, is considering a number of options including a possible sale of the business as it faces rising losses. The mutual lender will make a loss in the second half of the year as it sets aside more money to cover losses on commercial property loans, the building society's chief executive, Fergus Murphy, told RTÉ yesterday.
"The mutual model is working but we are also considering and evaluating other options which may be of interest to our members," Mr Murphy said when asked if EBS would remain independent. "So we wouldn't rule anything in or rule anything out."
Hi-tech Xsil in talks to sell stake
The owners of technology firm Xsil are in negotiations to sell a stake in the company to two unnamed parties in an effort to rescue jobs at the provider of laser tools to the semiconductor industry. Xsil's 44 staff were placed on protective notice in September but are now on temporary lay-off while negotiations over the sale continue.
Founder and chairman of Xsil, Peter Conlon, said the dramatic deterioration in the company's finances was due to delays in introducing new technology and customers not paying for products received as well as the wider economic downturn. Xsil generated a pretax profit of €8.5 million in 2006 on sales of €38.3 million and won the Deloitte Fast 50 award in 2006 for being Ireland's fastest growing technology company.
Accountant fined 5,000 and costs
The Chartered Accountants Regulatory Board, the regulatory body for members of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in Ireland, has fined a Limerick accountant €5,000 and ordered him to pay costs of €6,660. John A McGuigan, with an address at River Point, Bishops Quay, Limerick, was found to have failed to respond adequately to correspondence from the head of professional conduct.
Anglo Irish secures AAA rating
ANGLO IRISH Bank has secured an AAA rating, the top measure of financial strength, for its €30 billion programme of euro medium-term notes - loan notes that can be sold to investors to raise longer-term funding in the wholesale money markets.
The notes were assigned the measure by credit rating agency Fitch on the back of the State guarantee scheme. The agency said that no guaranteed note shall have a maturity date falling after September 29th, 2010 - the date the guarantee scheme expires.
Anglo Irish is expected to try to raise term funding from investors in the coming weeks in a planned sequence of borrowing by Irish banks starting with AIB, which was assigned an AAA rating to its €15 billion programme of euro medium-term notes last Friday.
REO says it will outperform market
Real Estate Opportunities (REO), a property company listed in London and Dublin, said it would outperform the property market "through the current property cycle and beyond," in a trading update yesterday.
REO said it had secured an increase of £40 million in its £185 million debt facility on Battersea Power Station since June.
It has also secured an increase of €50 million in an existing loan facility secured against its investment portfolio in Ireland and completed the sale of its interest in Dublin's Northside Shopping Centre for €29.75 million.
