The ruling had to do with whether Copenhagen-based Danske Bank was obliged to cooperate with an Irish Supreme Court order calling on it to provide documents and information on individuals resident in Ireland who held accounts with the Isle of Man branch of National Irish Bank. This came in the wake of the Irish bank’s “banking business” having been “transferred” to Danske Bank via a statutory scheme of arrangement in 2007, according to court documents in the case.
Danske formally took over NIB in 2005.
In his ruling, Deemster (“Judge” in the Isle of Man) Andrew Corlett declared that Danske was “not precluded by any obligation of confidentiality to any account holders through [its] former Isle of Man branch, insofar as those accounts are governed by Isle of Man law, from complying” with the Irish Supreme Court’s ruling.
“Should any individual Irish resident depositor or account holder wish to bring an action in this court once they are informed by the bank of the proposal to make the disclosure, which I anticipate will now be sanctioned by an…order of the Irish Supreme Court, they have the perfect right to do so, but in the circumstances I would hope that this will not be necessary,” Deemster Corlett added.
Danske Bank had been concerned that cooperating with the court order could mean that it was violating the former NIB depositors’ rights of client confidentiality.
National Irish Bank began to surrender its banking licence on the island as long ago as 2002, the court documents reveal. Danske doesn’t have any operations in the Isle of Man at present, but it does have at least one branch in Dublin.
Some 140 depositors were said to be potentially affected by the ruling, which was delivered last week.
To read the judgment in full on the Isle of Man Courts website, click here.
