Press release, 28 January by CADTM:
http://cadtm.org/EFTA-court-dismisses-Icesave
It is with some satisfaction that CADTM learns of the decision by the EFTA (European Free Trade Association) |1| court to dismiss all the complaints brought by the Netherlands and the UK against Iceland in the Icesave case. |2|
The judgement clearly states that it is not the responsibility of the parent nation of a banking company to cover the costs of the guarantees to their banking system, and the safety net structure must be financed by the banks themselves. This implicitly confirms that the normal liquidation process, as applied to ’Landsbanki’ (Icesave’s mother company) is quite correct when a bank, even too big to fail, has greater liabilities than assets. Which would be the case of most of the big European banks if the toxic assets on their balance sheets were counted at their real value. Sigue leyendo