If Irish mortgages are so profitable, why doesn't a foreign bank enter the market?

[Brendan Burgess]

From the Central Bank's report - Page 19

To foster competition, attracting new foreign entrants may be difficult in an environment which
has seen financial fragmentation and a retrenchment towards national banking markets
(Al-Eyd and Berkman, 2013; Barrell et al., 2011; ECB, Various). However, it is important
that there are not barriers to entry that serve to discourage new market participants in
Ireland.

 

[odyssey06]

A government which starts out saying that interest rates are a matter of corporate competition and outside their control, then threatens to significantly increase the banking levy for all banks if banks don't do what they think governments wants them to do... a CEO of a foreign bank ain't going to touch a market like that.

 

[thedaddyman]

Too many international banks have had the fingers burnt in the Irish mortgage market, RBS, Danske and Bank of Scotland are 3. No CEO or board of any bank anywhere in the world is going to take the risk of expanding into Ireland when so many other banks did the same and lost billions. It's got little or nothing to do with interest rates but is instead a reflection of lack of demand, over pricing in the Dublin market and a lack of confidence in the authorities. The fact that the national Govt has put pressure on banks to cut interest rates won't attract more competition either.