"Irish bank’s ex-CEO sits out crisis on Cape; Out of reach of police, regulators, he may be negotiating voluntarily" by Beth Healy and Casey Ross, Globe Staff | April 12, 2010
David K. Drumm was an affable and driven young banker in the late 1990s when he arrived in Boston to build a commercial loan business for Anglo Irish Bank. Willing to take bigger risks on bigger deals, Anglo Irish quickly became a major player in the city’s real estate market, ultimately financing such projects as the Mandarin Oriental hotel and the sale of Fan Pier on the South Boston Waterfront.
Related: Boston's New Ivory Tower
Rich Untouched by Real Estate Collapse
So in what malfeasance is this guy involved?
Success in Boston was Drumm’s springboard back to Dublin, where in 2005, at age 38, he became Anglo Irish’s chief executive. Under him Anglo Irish continued its roaring growth, the bank a much envied symbol of Ireland’s economy, which was booming at the time.
Drumm is now back in the United States, living in a $4.6 million waterfront home in Chatham. But it is not the retiring life of a successful businessman. Rather, he is a refugee from Ireland and its shattered economy, out of reach of Irish police and financial regulators, who want to question Drumm about the collapse of Anglo Irish Bank and questionable deals during his tenure. Of interest is whether any of those deals may have contributed to the demise of a company one Irish economist now calls the Celtic Chernobyl.
The Irish government took over Anglo Irish in January 2009, in a bailout that has cost taxpayers $16 billion....
Drumm resigned from Anglo Irish in late December 2008, after disclosures that chairman Sean FitzPatrick had received $115 million in hidden loans from the bank. Regulators are also investigating whether Anglo Irish executives engineered more than $9 billion in short-term deposits from an insurer to hide depositors’ withdrawals. No former Anglo Irish officials, including Drumm, have been charged with wrongdoing.
Bankers get away with anything and everything, don't they?
Police have questioned two former executives, including FitzPatrick, who was Drumm’s predecessor. But because Drumm is outside the country, Irish officials cannot order him to appear for questioning. They have asked him to cooperate voluntarily, and news accounts in Ireland indicate he is negotiating with authorities....
No one answered Friday morning when a Globe reporter knocked on the door of Drumm’s 4,622-square-foot Chatham home, on a cul-de-sac overlooking the Oyster River. Drumm did not return calls left at the house. Drumm’s real estate company no longer appears to be located at the South Boston office where it is listed....
They even went out to his house, huh?
Anglo Irish’s new bosses have detailed nearly $2 million Anglo Irish spent during Drumm’s tenure on golf outings that included flying Boston clients by private jet to some of Ireland’s better-known courses. Executives in Boston’s real estate community said the Irish golf trips were well-known and popular, and that Anglo Irish had a reputation for lavishly entertaining clients. The bank, for example, would host cocktail parties for the development community at the Four Seasons and Mandarin hotels.
That's what deposits and fraud are for, aren't they?
Drumm arrived in Boston in 1997, sent to establish a US beachhead for Anglo Irish....
Irish Anglo’s failure was one of the most stunning meltdowns in the banking sector when the credit crisis swept the globe in late 2008.
But this guy is living in a $4 million dollar home?
It recently announced the largest corporate loss in Ireland’s history: $17 billion for the 15-month period that ended in December. More than half of the bank’s loans are underwater and are being transferred to a new agency Ireland has set up, a “bad bank’’ intended to help rid lenders of toxic assets.
Translation: IRISH TAXPAYERS are getting SOAKED!
According to the latest annual report, 1 in 5 of the bank’s US loans are impaired, including loans for major properties in New York. Many of its loans to Boston clients appear to have fared well.
According to Irish news media accounts, Drumm has said he was advised by the bank’s new chairman to move to the United States to avoid the “blame culture’’ of Ireland and Great Britain.
Yes, by all means, do not accept blame even when guilty!
He and his wife bought the Chatham home in March 2008 and own a second one nearby that they bought seven months later for $2.6 million....
Oh, he and his wife OWN TWO HOMES, huh?
Un-flipping-real!
In January 2009, Drumm started a new business in Boston, a real estate consulting and advisory firm now called Delta Corporate Finance. There did not appear to be any business at the South Boston address listed for Delta Corporate on its incorporation papers filed with the state.
That looks like one of those fly-by-night scammers government is always warning us consumers about!
Like so many other banks, Anglo Irish has downsized.
But the taxpayer-funded bonuses have not been.
Its most recent Boston chief, Tony Campbell, left the bank just a few days ago, a spokeswoman for Anglo Irish confirmed. A message left for the bank’s new Boston manager, Eddie Byrne, was not returned. Anglo Irish employed about 100 people in the United States at the end of last year.
That's all?
Drumm remains well-known and well-liked in Boston, and few see him as the villain portrayed back home in Ireland....
Oh, his FRIENDS who were NOT LOOTED LIKE HIM?!!
Pfffft!
This is REPORTING?
--more--"
There was also a photograph in the April 13 edition of the Boston Globe that described a bombing in Ireland; however, I seem to have lost the clipping.
