Ireland will not need bond market funds until 2013

(DUBLIN) - Ireland will not need to return to the bond market to borrow funds until the second half of 2013, Finance Minister Michael Noonan told parliament on Tuesday.

"Based on the current projections and assuming no market access, the state has access to sufficient funds for its needs into the second half of 2013," Noonan said.

He had been asked by opposition lawmakers when Ireland would need to raise funds outside an 85 billion euro ($125 billion) EU/IMF bailout package the country received last November.

Noonan said it was the intention of the government's National Treasury Management Agency (NTMA) to return to the sovereign debt markets as soon as market conditions permit.

But he underlined that, based on conservative projections of Ireland's funding needs and taking account of funding possibilities, there is "no urgency" about a return to the markets.

Under current policy, the NTMA will "test the market in the third or fourth quarter of next year" even though Ireland will not need the funds at that point, Noonan said.

He told lawmakers he was giving them "the most prudent assessment of what's facing us in terms of what has to be paid back and what is available to us".

"I could give you a more benign estimate of the figures which would certainly carry us to the end of 2013 but I want to be absolutely prudent and give you what I see as the worst possible case scenario.

"There is no question of the sovereign side requiring additional funding in 2011 or 2012 and it will carry us into the second half of 2013," Noonan said.