PTSB poaches senior banking official from Department of Finance

PTSB has hired Scott Rankin, deputy head of the Department of Finance unit over the State’s stakes in bailed-out banks, to become the head of its investor relations division.

In late 2009, Mr Rankin, a former banking analyst, became the first private sector employee to join the department to help officials deal with the fast-developing banking crisis. He was officially employed by the National Treasury Management Agency and was on secondment to the department.

He is said to be on gardening leave and is expected to join the bank, which remains 57 per cent State-owned, this autumn, following a minimum three-month cooling-off period. It is understood that the final paperwork on the move has yet to be completed.

A spokesman for the department and spokeswoman for PTSB could not immediately comment on the appointment.

News of the appointment came as Taoiseach Simon Harris on Monday began a series of meetings with banks and non-bank lenders to discuss interest rates and the general banking environment. He met AIB chief executive Colin Hunt and PTSB chief executive Eamonn Crowley. The meetings were said to have been positive and constructive.

During Mr Rankin’s initial years at the department, he advised on various EU State-aid restructuring plans for bailed-out banks, becoming a banking adviser on the Irish negotiation team with officials from the International Monetary Fund and EU on the State’s 2010 bailout. He also represented the State in recapitalisation talks with Bank of Ireland, AIB and PTSB, which was then known as Irish Life & Permanent.

He has been deputy head of the bank shareholding and financial advisory division for more than a decade, under the division’s head, Des Carville. He played a key role in the 2015 initial public offering (IPO) of PTSB, a larger IPO of AIB two years later, the State’s sale of all of its shares in Bank of Ireland and the gradual reduction of its holding in AIB.

Mr Rankin also supported PTSB in reaching a deal to acquire €6.8 billion of loans and 25 branches from Ulster Bank, following the UK-owned lender’s decision to quit the market three years ago, and managed the Government’s sale of a 5 per cent stake in PTSB a year ago.

Mr Rankin is an economist by background and worked for Davy as head of financials research between February 1994 and October 2009. He hit the headlines two years ago when it emerged that he was Bono’s half-brother. The pair had spent much of their lives thinking they were cousins.

Mr Rankin joins PTSB at a time when it is seeking to convince regulators to allow it to reduce the implied riskiness of its mortgage book.

For every €100 of mortgages, the bank issues a so-called risk weighting of more than 40 per cent, against which it must hold capital. The high risk-weighted assets density is a result of the bank’s experience of the arrears crisis following the financial crash when as much as 28 per cent of its mortgages were non-performing.

By contrast, the risk weighting on new Bank of Ireland and AIB mortgages is in the 20s, which means they can write new business more competitively.

The State has recovered almost €2.8 billion of PTSB’s €4 billion bailout in 2011. The total includes cash received from the sale of PTSB’s former sister company Irish Life, share sales in the bank, redemption of bailout bonds, guarantee fees and interest payments. Its remaining stake is worth just over €400 million.