Davy’s bonds scandal is a tale of female exclusion

WHILE the Central Bank had its hands full dealing with rogue stockbroking firm Davy, it still found time to deliver a rap on the knuckles to the finance world for its reluctance to promote women.

The facts and figures tell their own depressing story: women make up less than a sixth of applicants for roles which carry responsibility for strategy or business revenue, while female applications for board positions fell by two percentage points from 2019 to 2020.

The scandal at Davy seems to tell a similar tale of female exclusion. Granted, the identity is not known of all the 16 staff involved in the O’Connell Partnership, the name given to the ‘consortium’ who bought bonds from a client at an agreed price, but there is not one woman among the six executives who steered the shady deal to completion. Nor has a woman featured in the other names bandied about in the media and online as likely accomplices. It appears that while the tantalising prospect of profiteering from the Anglo-Irish bonds presented itself, not one woman in Davy was invited to enjoy a slice of the action.

The lads carved up the spoils between themselves, just as they guard the plum jobs and perks, like this century’s Mad Men. What arguably makes it worse is that they were probably oblivious to it.

Whatever the Davy saga tells us about conflict of interest and compliance controls, the homogeneity of its top brass seems a perfect illustration of the Central Bank’s contention that diversity at the higher levels is a safety valve against ‘behaviour, culture and governance risks’.

It’s tempting to think that if the equal opportunities ideal is not enough to force an endlessly selfperpetuating man’s world to relinquish control, the prospect of saving them from themselves might do the trick.