Taxpayer won't fund FitzPatrick's €25m pension
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DISGRACED former Anglo Irish Bank chairman Sean FitzPatrick may be sitting on a vast pension pot of as much as €25m, according to pension experts. The sheer scale of FitzPatrick's pension will casue fury among shareholders who lost everything when the bank was nationalised.
At 60 last June, Mr FitzPatrick, who resigned as chairman of Anglo last December amid controversial revelations about hidden loans, has reached the retirement age of many bankers.
He got an entitlement to an annual pension of €533,000 when he retired as Anglo boss in January 2005.
However, the total value of his pension over his retirement could clock up to between €20m and €25m, according to pension experts who totted up the value of his pension using Anglo's annual accounts. At the very least, Mr FitzPatrick's pension pot would hit between €13.5m and €15.5m, according to a pension actuary.
Like all of those with private pensions, Mr FitzPatrick can take a quarter of his pension as a tax-free lump sum, which could be between €3.4m and €6m, based on the estimates from our pension experts.
Unlike Fred Goodwin, the former Royal Bank of Scotland chief executive who infuriated the British government and public last week when he insisted he would not give up his £693000 (€776,175) annual pension, taxpayers do not have to foot the bill for Mr FitzPatrick's pension.
The Department of Finance said last week, that despite the nationalisation of Anglo, it is considered a commercial semi-state company and is responsible for its own pension scheme. Mr FitzPatrick did not wish to comment when contacted by the Sunday Independent last week.
Separately, a consortium of Irish and foreign investors, believed to be Mallabraca, has held talks with the Government about taking a majority shareholding in Anglo and investing €5bn in the bank.
- Louise McBride
