Employers’ group Ibec has called for Ireland’s international travel restrictions to be ended and for testing and tracing to be used in place of “ineffective” quarantine measures. People entering Ireland from abroad currently have to quarantine themselves for 14 days upon arrival into the country. Ibec CEO Danny McCoy said there were benefits from quarantine…
Category Archives: News
Consumer sentiment improved in June for the second month in a row, but remains well below levels recorded before the onset of the COVID-19 crisis, a survey showed today. The KBC Bank consumer sentiment index climbed to 61.6 in June from 52.3 in May, but remains some distance from February’s pre-pandemic reading of 85.2. In…
The International Monetary Fund has further lowered its forecasts for global economic growth this year. In its World Economic Outlook published today, the IMF said economies around the world have been more negatively impacted in the first half of the year than it had anticipated and recovery has been more gradual than previously forecast. …
The country’s five retail banks are likely to extend a six-month break on loan repayments so that they can help homeowners cope with financial difficulty caused by the coronavirus. This will be a shift from a three-month mortgage break that borrowers had been given by the banks before the COVID-19 impact. According to the Banking…
A Government fund aimed at helping small and medium-sized enterprises to reopen and rebuild – as the Covid-19 pandemic restrictions are eased – needs to be at least quadrupled in size, according to employers’ group Ibec. Ibec also said that loans with 100% State-backed credit guarantees and an interest rate holiday of 12 months are required if small…
The impact of Covid-19 on how consumers are spending is recorded in the latest figures from the banking sector. In May, consumers spent €600 million using contactless payments, the highest monthly figure on record. The figures were compiled by Banking and Payments Federation Ireland. Every day in May, more than €19 million was spent using…
Global trade is expected to drop around 18.5% year-on-year in the second quarter of 2020 in a huge coronavirus-driven plunge which nonetheless could have been much worse, the WTO said today. “Initial estimates for the second quarter, when the virus and associated lockdown measures affected a large share of the global population, indicate a year-on-year…
A new report warns that up to 50% of restaurants in Ireland face closure unless an emergency grant aid package is issued by the Government. The latest Restaurants Association of Ireland report also warns that recently promoted staycations or weekends away will not be an option if the tourism and hospitality industry is not supported….
Decisions taken in the next six months will impact the small and medium enterprise sector for the next five years, according to a treasury specialist who works closely with the sector. John Finn, Managing Director of Treasury Solutions – which helps businesses deal with a range of issues including cash flow, lending and currency management…
465,900 people are now receiving the Covid-19 Pandemic Unemployment Payment – a drop of 32,800 over the last week. This is according to the latest figures from the Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection today. At the peak of the Covid-19 crisis, 598,000 people who had lost their jobs were claiming the Pandemic Unemployment Payment. Since…