Credit ratings company Fitch has downgraded Canada-based Mountain Province, of which the billionaire is the major shareholder

Figures compiled by Monterey Insight, an independent fund research company, show the value of Irish-domiciled funds grew by 10.4 per cent to a market size of just over $3.3 trillion.

Investors will buy perpetual bonds only from an entity that they believe will continue to exist for the foreseeable future, sadly this is not true of the European Union today — so the time has come for individual nations to take action