# Irish Banks: 139th out of 139 for soundness



## canicemcavoy (9 Sep 2010)

http://www.rte.ie/news/2010/0909/competitiveness.html

A gobsmacking result:



> A report on economic competitiveness has placed Ireland *bottom of a list of 139 countries* worldwide for the state of its banks.
> The Global Competitiveness Report is compiled by the World Economic Forum after a survey of businesses in each country, and covers a range of factors affecting each country's business climate.
> Overall, Ireland has fallen four places to 29th in the 2010-11 report, dragged down by low rankings in the financial markets category.
> AdvertisementIn the 'soundness of banks' rankings, Ireland is last, behind even Iceland and Greece, while Ireland ranks only 117th for ease of access to loans.
> Access to loans was rated as the biggest problem for doing business in the Irish survey.


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## Towger (9 Sep 2010)

Reread it:


> Overall, Ireland has fallen* four places to 29th* in the 2010-11 report, dragged down by low rankings in the financial markets category.


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## canicemcavoy (9 Sep 2010)

Towger said:


> Reread it:


 
Take your own advice. That figure is for _overall competitiveness_. The 139th out of 139 is specifically for soundness of the banks.


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## Towger (9 Sep 2010)

They must have a very low weight on the 'soundness' value when calculating the over all value.


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## canicemcavoy (9 Sep 2010)

Here's an interactive version of the report:

http://gcr.weforum.org/

There's a huge range of factors (education, health, telecommunications) so no one factor would sway the overall result that much even if it's as abymal as the banking result. For example, it's a relief that we are still at a top ranking with our incidence of malaria; I imagine even the current government could not affect that much although having said that, Mary Coughlan has never been given the Health portfolio.

Noticeable, all of the lowest rankings are related to the banks/finance:

[broken link removed]


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## Chris (9 Sep 2010)

canicemcavoy said:


> For example, it's a relief that we are still at a top ranking with our incidence of malaria; I imagine even the current government could not affect that much although having said that, Mary Coughlan has never been given the Health portfolio.


HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA


And here for some more dire rankings:
Government Budget Balance: 130
National Savings Rate: 119
Government Debt: 112


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