Member Info for joxer22

I agree that Blackrock are ruthless and they have shown this time and time again. However, they have been buying and selling tranches of BIRG all the way up from €1.40 but still increasing their overall stake. While they will probably continue to roll over some of their earlier purchases at big profits it's unlikely they are buying such large volumes in the high €7's in order to dump them at €8. They will be looking for bigger gains on these buys.

Higher trading volumes combined with price rises is always a good sign. I would not be surprised to see some of the larger European banks taking positions in BIRG to get a slice of one of the few banking growth markets.

AIB was great value a few months ago sub €2. It’s still got a bit to go but nowhere near a multiple of the current price

The ECB changed the interest rates on targeted long term refinancing loans so the Irish banks won't keep the sweet deal they had of getting a higher interest rate on their deposits with the ECB versus the lower borrowing rate. It's not hugely significant but it will erase some easy profits they were making.

Proverbs 26.4 gives good advice

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It's very specific to the Irish banks - the European bank index is up over 2% today and the US banks did well yesterday. The volumes are not very high so it's probably just some fund reducing their holdings. There has been mainly small trading volumes in both banks today with a few larger (but not huge) sells.

AIB performance really lagged BIRG this year but it's certainly starting to move this month - up over 20% to date in October.

Not sure - It was part of a block of large trades that traded off book/on exchange for 7.192 - previous price was 7.13 so they look like buys

A few large trades today - looks like the biggest single trade was for 800K shares

Looks like it's going to be a baptism of fire for Francesca over at Credit Suisse. Whenever a financial organisation is quoted as "reassuring investors" that's always a bit scary.

Agreed - the market can now assess BIRG with most of the known uncertainties resolved. On paper everything looks very positive for the business to thrive in the coming years . Of course the external environment is unpredictable and financial stocks are always very susceptible to global shocks. My main concerns however would be the future Irish political landscape with the potential for reckless economic policies and political interference with the banking sector.

Looks like the tracker fine for BIRG will be announced tomorrow - at least that will be one uncertainty out of the way.

20 Million shares traded today (~ 147Million Euro) - wonder what that's about?

I agree that £10 is not out of the question- most of the analysts are starting to up their targets to reflect the opportunity here. BIRG has everything going for it at present - private ownership, minimal bad debt, great loan/deposit ratio, new customers handed to them on a plate, interest rates rocketing etc. AIB is currently lagging in performance as there are the obvious issues with the government holding, however it's also a great buy at current prices - plus there is always the possibility of a dividend windfall at AIB as they are rolling in cash at present.

Interesting day - usually AIB and BIRG roughly track the European bank indexes but with slightly larger moves (both up and down). Today both banks diverged significantly from the main euro bank stocks so this would seem to imply specific target buying of the Irish banks rather than the usual ETF action - probably some institution(s) buying into the Irish bank story.

The European banks index is up about 3.5% today based on the ECB actions. BIRG has a much better deposit/loan ratio than the majority of EU banks so it deserves a premium for it's sensitivity to rate increases. Also BIRG is the primary bank in an open, agile economy with the fastest growth rate in Europe - not to mention additional growth from thousands of new accounts based on circumstances. The government are within weeks of closing out their position which also adds to its attractiveness. BIRG will thrive over the next few years as a standalone operation but they would also be a great bolt on acquisition for any large global banking group.

Big response to the .75 hike - straight to the bottom line for BIRG

Wonder why they haven't put out an RNS yet about Myles O'Grady

ST says Myles O'Grady has been chosen for CEO