THE FINANCE MINISTER has said that the government may look to begin selling shares in nationalised AIB before the next general election.

Speaking at the World Economic Forum Davos today, Michael Noonan told Bloomberg Television that ‘confidence is growing’ and that he was ‘hopeful’ that Ireland could be upgraded to an A rating by credit agencies.

On nationalised banks, Noonan told John Fraher that although he didn’t expect to fully sell the 99 per cent stake the government has in AIB in any short time-frame, it could begin to sell shares before the 2016 election.

“The government will have an election at the latest at the end of March, early April 2016. So, we might test the market ahead of that, but I wouldn’t envisage a privatisation of the AIB or anything like that.

“Now Bank of Ireland is different, we’re holding less than 14 per cent of Bank of Ireland at present and it’s a question of price when we’d actually sell there, but we’re under no pressure, but we certainly won’t fire sale or be forced into anything like that.”

Noonan went on to say that he doesn’t expect the state to foot any bill in terms of bank recapitalisation and was asked about what keeps him up at night.

“I sleep every night. Things don’t keep me awake at night. If you’d ask me what would I provision against? I’d be very conscious that we need very strong fiscal discipline going forward and to get the deficit down below 3 per cent and to continue on with that.”

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