Former taoiseach Brian Cowen has said he did not consider a 15 per cent decline in the share price of Anglo Irish Bank on St Patrick's Day 2008 to be something in the bank's business model.

He told the Oireachtas Banking Inquiry he thought the sharp fall was related to the large position that now bankrupt businessman Seán Quinn was rumoured to have built up in the institution at the time.

Mr Cowen said he didn’t do anything about the issue at the time as “these were regulatory matters and I don’t believe there should be political interference in relation to regulatory matters.”

He said he received a phone call from Seán FitzPatrick, Anglo’s chairman, around the time of the share price crash.

“The purpose of his phone call was to say to me . . . that this had happened in relation to the share price and that they believed that there was a position being taken by Mr Quinn in relation to their share and . . . that this information was out in the markets or whatever,” he said.

“And I said that these are regulatory matters, these are matters he needed to refer down to the Central Bank and to the Financial Regulator and have it dealt with there.”

Mr Cowen also detailed his attendance at a dinner hosted by Anglo on April 28th, 2008. He said it followed an invitation from his friend and Anglo non-executive director Fintan Drury.

“It was informal. There was no big speeches really. I didn’t go with any brief or guide or didn’t bring any papers or anything like that. It was sort of a courtesy thing that I had never met them during all the time I was minister [for finance] and they just felt it wouldn’t be right if I hadn’t . . . didn’t meet me before I left office.”

Mr Cowen said the difficulties being experienced by the bank at the time were not discussed that evening.

The former Laois-Offaly TD insisted he was not lobbied by anyone in favour of a blanket bank guarantee ahead of the decision being taken.

Mr Cowen was questioned by Fianna Fáil’s Michael McGrath about whether he was contacted ahead of the move in 2008.

“No I had no requests about a guarantee from anyone,” he said.

Former secretary general of the department of finance Kevin Cardiff said bankers had lobbied him from early 2008 in favour of a guarantee.

Mr Cowen, who was taoiseach when the decision was made, insisted nobody contacted him at any stage.

The former Fianna Fáil leader was minister for finance until May 2008 was on Thursday quizzed abut his time in the department at the banking inquiry.

Mr Cowen insisted there was no crisis when he handed over the reins to Brian Lenihan and said liquidity issues in the banks had been raised eight or nine months previously.

The former taoiseach said he did not accept he had mismanaged the economy.

“People can have their criticisms of it but there is a very clear policy position behind what we were trying to do,” Mr Cowen said.