Madam, – Dr Mark Perry (July 12th) is incorrect to assert that the National Asset Management Agency (Nama) paid €15.3 billion for the first tranche of loans it acquired from the five participating institutions. In fact, it paid €7.7 billion, approximately half that sum.
Dr Perry is also wrong to wonder why the quality and performance of the loans were not analysed prior to their acquisition. Nama carried out rigorous due diligence on each and every one of the 1,800 loans before acquiring them. In other words, Nama paid for the loans not on the basis of what it had been told by the financial institutions but on the basis of its own detailed due diligence examination. It was this very analysis – and its surprising and disappointing findings – that resulted in a discount of 50 per cent, substantially in excess of what the institutions and indeed the general public were expecting. This demonstrates the exacting approach taken by Nama. – Yours, etc,