Eu-member or in this case EEA member and your banks can operate everywhere. meanwhile they are still regulated and deposit-insured by their national states.

As Iceland demonstrates, that is a bad rule.

and up to a point Ireland shows, is a problem.

No depositors have so far been in danger in Ireland - only bondholders who should lose their shirts.

And once you have opened for savers out of other EU-countries, they are as senior as your domestic savers and you have to treat both the same way.

No, they really shouldn't.

The British depositors can still petition their own government for restitution. Since the British government is more likely to cover British depositors than Icelandic depositors, the Icelandic government is justified in giving domestic depositors preferential treatment.

Management and bondholders should, of course, lose their shirts no matter their nationality.

- Jake

Friends come and go. Enemies accumulate.