FEARS are mounting that Ireland could default on its soaring national debt pile, amid continuing worries about its troubled banking sector.

The cost of buying insurance against Irish government bonds rose to record highs on Friday, having almost tripled in a week. Debt-market investors now rank Ireland as the most troubled economy in Europe.

Simon Johnson, the former chief economist of the International Monetary Fund, called for this weekend’s meeting of G7 finance ministers to put Ireland’s troubles at the top of the agenda.

Johnson said: “Don’t, please, tell me more about the basic principles of financial reform unless and until you have addressed the Irish problem. And don’t tell me the Irish have to sort this out for themselves. Eventually, the world always comes to help; check your notes on Iceland.
...
Following the scandal at Anglo Irish Bank over undisclosed loans, the market fears there are more hidden problems that could ultimately fall to the state to resolve.

With Ireland set to borrow an additional €15 billion (£13.4 billion) this year, the national debt pile will hit €70 billion.

The cost of insuring Irish debt hit 350 basis points on Friday, meaning that for every £100 of debt it would cost £3.50 to insure against default. A year ago it would have cost 10p to insure every £100 of Irish debt.

Fears are growing that Ireland could default on its national debt after the cost to insure against possible losses on loans to the country rose to record highs at the end of last week.

But the most startling fact to emerge this week is that the country which is seen as the most vulnerable, and therefore the most likely to ditch the euro, is not Slovenia, or Cyprus, or Greece, but Ireland.

Until a year ago, the Republic's Celtic Tiger economy, which attracted such blue-chip companies as Dell, Microsoft and Intel, seemed unstoppable. In a decade, the Irish economy grew by almost 90 per cent, catapulting it from one of the poorest countries in Europe to the fourth-richest per capita. Government advisers from as far afield as Chile and Israel made pilgrimages to marvel at a model that they were desperate to emulate.

Not any more. All of a sudden, Ireland's debt-fuelled economy, built largely on a construction boom, has collapsed in a more spectacular manner than almost any other in Europe. Irish government bonds are rated as the riskiest in the EU (see graphic), and there has been panicky talk of Ireland as "the next Iceland".

On the streets, there is a whiff of revolution, with 120,000 people staging Dublin's biggest mass rally in 30 years last weekend to protest at the government's handling of the economy and its decision to impose what amounted to a pay cut on public sector workers. The unions have now threatened a "Doomsday" strike next month if the prime minister, Brian Cowen, does not think again. As the celebrated Irish economist David McWilliams put it: "The entire Irish episode will be studied internationally in years to come as an example of how not to do things."
...
Irish families on middle and even low incomes cashed in their pensions or borrowed heavily to buy second, third or even fourth properties, believing they could rent them out to the migrant workers who had caused net immigration for the first time in Ireland's history. They could borrow from banks that enjoyed one of the loosest regulatory regimes in Europe, and which shipped in money from abroad to further stoke up the boom.

Ireland now has up to 350,000 empty homes – more than its entire private rental market – many of them simply abandoned as builders went bust. House prices are expected to fall by 80 per cent.

Ireland might have been able to withstand Europe's most savage property collapse had not its export trade been shredded at the same by currency devaluation in its two key markets – Britain and America.

The relative rise in the value of the euro against sterling and the dollar has made Irish goods – and wages – prohibitively expensive. Businesses in the north of the Republic are on their knees because competitors in Northern Ireland are undercutting them by as much as half.

BANK of Ireland reported pre-tax losses of almost €1bn (£895m) yesterday and warned it may need another state bailout.

The bank, which has 44 branches in Northern Ireland and runs a financial services joint venture with the UK Post Office, said the past six months had been difficult as it gave a cautious appraisal of future economic prospects.

Shares in Ireland’s biggest bank have slid on fears that delays in the launch of the National Asset Management Agency (NAMA) would hinder attempts to raise capital privately.

“While the group’s strong preference would be to raise capital from private sources... ultimately it may be required to seek capital from the Irish government,” Bank of Ireland said in a statement.