The high level of mortgage arrears in the Irish financial system and the associated overhang on economic growth underlines the importance of prudent lending standards throughout the property cycle. Macro-prudential tools such as loan-to-value (LTV) ratio caps and loan-to-income (LTI) ratio caps...

This Letter provides an overview of the Central Bank of Ireland's Loan Loss Forecasting framework. This framework, which utilises detailed loan-level data provided on a six-monthly basis by domestic Irish banks, includes internally- developed probability of default (PD) models and a cash ow...

Macro-prudential policy is designed to address risk at a systemwide level, an example of which is mortgage default following excessive residential property lending in Ireland. Policy tools to address this risk, such as caps on loan- to-value and loan-to-income ratios, are used to build balance...

This Letter compiles information on central bank minutes from a number of sources. First, we look at the academic literature which suggests that central bank minutes can provide additional information above other forms of communication. Second, we make use of a comprehensive set of information...

The Central Bank recently published a Consultation document on macro-prudential policy for residential mortgage lending including limits on loan-to-value and loan-to-income ratios. The consultation process highlighted a number of potential implications of these measures for the housing market,...

This letter presents trends and stylised facts on Irish corporate liquidations. The data show that liquidations in Ireland follow the pattern of the business cycle, with the recent nancial crisis coinciding with a dramatic increase in corporate liquidations. The breakdown of liquidations by both...

When setting monetary policy, central banks seek to aect the entire term structure of interest rates. Most central banks with a price stability or in ation mandate do this by targeting a very short-term market rate. This Letter presents a comparative analysis of the correlation between policy...

In this note, the continued fall in Irish house prices is examined. The increased rate of decline in 2011 resulted in Irish prices being almost 50 per cent down from peak levels of mid 2007. Accordingly, in over forty years of house price data, the fall is now one of the most significant across...

In this note, a recently published model of the Irish residential mortgage market is used to generate likely scenarios for Irish house prices out to 2013. The model allows for the interaction between house prices and mortgage credit as well as key macroeconomic variables and housing supply....

This note presents estimates of the likely credit requirements of different sectors of the economy over a short-term horizon to 2013. The measure of credit “demand” used in the analysis is the stock of outstanding loans to the Irish private sector from the resident banking sector. The...