As finance director of Anglo Irish Bank, Willie McAteer was the second-highest- ranking executive after chief executive Seán FitzPatrick and later David Drumm, when the latter took over running the bank in 2005.
Mr McAteer was a long-serving member of the bank’s board of directors.
Originally from Donegal, Mr McAteer, a chartered accountant, joined Anglo as finance director in June 1992 after working at the financial company Yeoman International Leasing, where he was managing director.
Prior to that he had worked at accountancy firm Pricewaterhouse, where he was a partner.
The 61-year-old was finance director of Anglo when the government introduced the bank guarantee in September 2008 and when the bank was nationalised in January 2009.
He also held the position of chief risk officer at the same time.
He resigned from the bank the week before it was nationalised.
Mr McAteer was one of the highest paid bankers at Anglo. He was paid €660,000 in the bank’s financial year to September 2008, his final full year at the bank, and €1.4 million the previous year.
He was also a major shareholder in the bank at the time of its collapse. He held 3.5 million shares, the second-largest number of shares held by a board member of the bank after Mr FitzPatrick. The value of his shares was wiped out when Anglo was nationalised.
Mr McAteer was, before yesterday, arrested twice during the three-and-a-half- year investigation into the bank – in March 2010 and November 2011. On both occasions he was questioned at Irishtown Garda station in Dublin, after being arrested at his home in the suburb of Rathgar.
