FINGLETON’S GIFT TO CHARITY

Michael Fingleton, the former boss of the beleaguered Irish Nationwide Building Society, made most of the Sunday papers. In what the Sunday Independent called “a dramatic development”, a close associate of Fingleton was quoted as saying he never intended to keep his controversial €1 million bonus payment for his own personal use. The money remained untouched in a deposit account in the building society and he wanted to distribute it to a number of charities. Fingleton claimed he wanted to have the money recognised as “a contractual payment” rather than a performance bonus.
The Business Post revealed that Irish Nationwide did not receive two-thirds of all the interest that it reported as income last year. Instead, it rolled up the interest into extra lending to customers who were not in a position to pay back their loans. The building society, which last week reported mammoth losses of €2.5 billion for 2009, has disclosed the existence of €324 million in phantom interest – technically known as unrealised interest income that it did not receive in cash.