The new chairman of the FAI, Roy Barrett, joined investment bank SG Warburg in London just two months before Black Monday, when the Dow Jones fell by over 20 per cent in one day in 1987. It was a chaotic and exciting start to a stockbroking career that would take Barrett ultimately to the top of Ireland’s oldest stockbroking firm Goodbody. Along the way he worked on some of the biggest corporate deals of the boom, bust and recovery. He saw the ownership of Goodbody change hands multiple times. Yet he remained in charge. Barrett has shown repeatedly in his career that he has the hidden steel and intelligence needed to lead during a crisis. A low key figure, Barrett is unused to the spotlight. He rarely speaks to the press. He is not one for the social circuit.
He prefers a pint in Mary Macs, a pub in Ballsbridge, with a couple of his friends rather than schmoozing in a Michelin star restaurant on a Friday. Those who know him say he is good at team building and letting others shine, while providing leadership in the background.
Barrett is already successful and in no need of additional gigs. He is not a big ego.
Barrett is certainly risking his reputation taking on the Augean task of cleaning up the FAI.
But just who is he? Where did he come from? And why he is prepared to become chair of Ireland’s scandal-riven national football association?
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Roy Barrett went to Blackrock College, a private school in South Dublin renowned for its rugby teams. Barrett, however, captained its soccer team to an All Ireland. His coach in school was a young Fintan Drury, who would later become one of the FAI’s strongest critics. In school, Barrett was a good centre forward. He was tough, but not a dirty player. After school Barrett went to UCD, where he studied law before doing a masters in business. During this time, he developed an interest in the stock market. He also played soccer for UCD. He was not a regular on the senior team, but he played to a decent level.
A life-long Leeds United fan, Barrett later encouraged his children to play soccer. He has been involved in schoolboy football in Dublin, and at least one of his sons played for a team in Dublin.
He is a big football fan, and follows it avidly along with horseracing. He is a regular in Cheltenham, and is known to take significant but measured bets if he thinks he knows a winner.
Becoming chair of the FAI is a risk, but clearly Barrett feels it is one worth taking. He is 57, so he has both experience and energy. Both will certainly be needed. He is also someone who, from the start of his career, has looked overseas, which again will be vital as the FAI engages with UEFA in the weeks and months ahead.
These characteristics can be seen from early on in his career.
The early days
Roy Barrett’s early stint in London, where he also worked for Paribas Capital Markets, gave him an appreciation of the strength of international blue-chip equities, versus the more insular Irish market.
In 1990 Barrett returned to Dublin to work for Dermot Desmond’s stockbroking firm NCB. Barrett was “somewhat of an exotic bird,” according to a former colleague. “He specialised in international equities and dealt with institutional investors,” the colleague recalled. “He was competitive. Good at managing people and he delivered for the business.”
Barrett played five-a-side football for NCB; his preferred position was forward or midfield. Minister for Sport Shane Ross hails from a slightly earlier vintage in NCB. Ross joined the firm in the late 1980s after the one he worked for was acquired by Desmond.
“The first cost (Desmond) cut was me, which was a pretty shrewd move!” Ross recalled in a 2002 newspaper column.
Barrett had a more stellar career in stockbroking than Ross, who was better known at that time for socialising.
Ross went on to become business editor with The Sunday Independent as well as moving into politics.
Barrett was part of a talented team working for Desmond and his co-founder Nigel McDermott, who went on to set-up Cardinal Capital with Nick Corcoran.
NCB had a culture that fostered talent and entrepreneurialism, and its graduates today occupy many senior positions across Ireland’s financial sector.
Barrett is part of that network, but he is independent.
“There is mutual respect for him in the industry,” an ex-NCB peer recalls. “He is a tough competitor but doesn’t have many enemies. You would have to respect him for bringing Goodbody through the crash.”
Barrett will undoubtedly be seeking to win back sponsorship confidence in Irish football, by putting in the right corporate governance processes at boardroom level.
Barrett left NCB in 1995, the year after Desmond sold the business to Ulster Bank. Barrett is friendly, but not overly close with Desmond, who recently invested €2 million in Shamrock Rovers, and is the long-term shareholder of Celtic.
Investors like Desmond, as well as Barrett’s close connections to big potential sponsors in business, could form part of the FAI’s turnaround.
Three Ireland’s recent ending of its sponsorship of the FAI was understandable given all the scandals. Barrett will undoubtedly be seeking to win back sponsorship confidence in Irish football, by putting in the right corporate governance processes at boardroom level.
He has connections at the highest levels in Irish business, but he is low-key about it. He is also used to the corridors of power through his firm’s government advisory work on everything from Eircom to Aer Lingus.
Once Barrett is convinced that the FAI is on the road to recovery, these will undoubtedly prove useful in helping the association out of its financial quagmire.
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Roy Barrett has an innate ability to look around corners and manage issues. He did not spot Ireland’s financial crisis – few did – but he did show considerable character in dealing with it. He got through the wreckage, when many executives at the top of financial services firms didn’t.
The reason Barrett left NCB all those years ago was because he could see that the parent company of his new bosses in Ulster Bank saw what he was doing in Dublin as competition to its business in London.
He was shrewd enough to see that in the long-term this meant that NCB’s new owner was going to favour its Natwest Capital Markets arm in London over his division. It was time to move on.
In January 1995, AIB beefed up its Goodbody stockbroking arm by poaching Barrett to manage both its domestic and international equity operations.
The Irish Times then described the arrival of Barrett as a “major coup.”
In April 1996, Barrett was made managing director of Goodbody, after Peadar O’Shea, left to set up his own investment advisory company.
In a sign of AIB’s confidence in Barrett, it allowed him also to continue as head of equities.
“There were people in AIB who would have liked to have swallowed up Goodbody entirely. But he managed to keep the brand independent. This meant it could eventually escape us when we hit the skids.”
Former AIB banker
Over the next decade, the chief executive position of AIB changed several times, but Barrett remained in situ.
“Roy understands office politics. He knows how to manage up as well as down. Other senior people in AIB came and went, but he stayed put,” a Goodbody colleague said.
“There were people in AIB who would have liked to have swallowed up Goodbody entirely. But he managed to keep the brand independent. This meant it could eventually escape us when we hit the skids,” a former AIB banker said.
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As head of Goodbody, Roy Barrett was involved in many of the biggest deals of the boom. It advised the government on the 1999 floatation of Eircom. Eircom’s shares peaked at €5.30 after the floatation delivering, a windfall for the Exchequer.
However, the shares later fell back, partly because of weakness in the European telecoms sector.
Thousands of small-time investors who bought in after the float were burned.
Shane Ross, by then a senator and journalist, became a high profile critic of the company along with broadcaster Eamon Dunphy.
After Ross’s performance at Eircom’s 2000 annual general meeting, there was speculation in the press for the first time that he might take a tilt at the Dail.
Ross would not make this move until 2011, but his criticism of Eircom undoubtedly raised his political profile.
“Looking back, Goodbody’s task was to float Eircom at the highest price the market was prepared to pay. That’s what it did. It made money for the state. It cannot be blamed for what happened to the price afterwards,” a stockbroking source said.
“The decision by Eircom to sell its mobile arm (in 2001) destroyed a lot of value. Eircom’s shares might well have recovered eventually if it had not made that and other strategic mistakes. The irony maybe today is the Eircom debacle helped Shane Ross on his political way.”
Eircom was one of only many deals that Barrett was involved in.
“I think Roy’s real ability as a leader is that he held onto his core team in Goodbody. He lets them get on with it. Guys like Brian O’Kelly (co-head of investment banking) and Finbarr Griffin (head of corporate finance) are top-drawer,” a rival stockbroker said.
“It is a skill as a leader to know when you are needed and when you are not. That will be useful as chairman of the FAI.”
Goodbody was only a third of the size of its arch-rival Davy, but it still managed to win key advisory work. It is a longtime advisor to Paddy Power.
It worked, for example, with the government on the floatation of Aer Lingus. Years later it switched sides and advised airline giant IAG on acquiring the former state-owned airline.
Under Barrett, Goodbody developed a good reputation in the markets during the 2000s. Davy was still the biggest, but Goodbody had its loyal supporters.
It built up a significant private wealth business too alongside its corporate advisory work. It was a good operator, making profits for its owner AIB, as well its staff bonus pool.
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Given the scale of Goodbody’s financial interests, it is not unexpected that it occasionally faced controversy. Roy Barrett was a witness in an 87-day legal battle between Fyffes, an international fruit business run by the McCann family; and investment firm DCC, then led by Jim Flavin, who was also a director of Fyffes. Barrett did well in the box as a witness, and there was no suggestion of wrongdoing of him in court. An experience of a High Court grilling in 2005, however, should be useful when working with the many parties and politicians now trying to save the FAI.
In 2006, former Goodbody stock-broker Bruce Ashmore sued Goodbody and the Financial Regulator. Ashmore was reported to be seeking €22 million because of an allegedly unsatisfactory reference he received from Barrett.
The case was settled in May 2006 on terms that were not disclosed by the court, but it heard it involved “no payment of damages or costs” to Ashmore by either Goodbody, its parent AIB or the regulator.
Afterwards Ashmore, a former head of equity trading at Goodbody, only said: “I live to fight another day.”
Again, Barrett, took this unpleasant legal action in his stride.
“A huge dislocation”
When the crash came, Goodbody, like every other stockbroker was badly hit.
At its peak in 2007, about €200 billion worth of equities were traded in Ireland, but by 2011 that was only €50 billion.
Barrett described this collapse in a 2011 Irish Times interview as “a huge dislocation.”
Goodbody, like other stockbrokers, was involved in selling property and various leveraged investments to its clients in the final years of the boom.
Its private clients backed Taggart Holdings, a leading builder in Northern Ireland, in the property bubble. Taggart and Goodbody set up a venture in 2006 to buy up to €300 million worth of land in Northern Ireland funded by a mix of debt and €30 million in equity from Goodbody clients. The business later went into administration. Other deals involving private client funds also collapsed as Ireland’s economy went into meltdown.
Barrett has rarely taken on non-executive directorships, but he made an exception for International Securities Trading Corporation (ISTC), a banking finance company.
It became the first high-profile Irish victim of the financial crash. Set up by former Anglo Irish Bank executive Tiernan O’Mahony, ISTC raised €165 million from high roller investors including Peter Sutherland, Lochlann Quinn, Denis O’Brien, Sean FitzPatrick and Bernard McNamara.
Goodbody was involved in raising some of the funds that went into ISTC. It then operated an informal grey market in ISTC shares, which at first tripled in value before going to zero. Not all of these investors were sophisticated high rollers. Somehow small-time investors ended up with an exposure to a business they ill-understood, but lost all their money on.
Barrett behaved honourably as a director of ISTC and did his best in horrific circumstances.
With the markets in meltdown, Goodbody’s position was made worse by the woes of its parent AIB. Ireland’s once largest bank was on the brink of going under until the state stepped in to bail it out. Goodbody needed to devise an escape plan, or potentially face into years of stagnation with an owner unable to invest and grow it.
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In January 2011, Kerry-based Fexco paid €24 million to buy Goodbody from AIB, in what turned out to be one of the bargain deals of the bust.
Roy Barrett and more than 30 other staff got a 25 per cent stake in the business. Crucially, Barrett put in place a clause in the deal that allowed Goodbody ratchet up its stake in the business to 49 per cent over time.
Kerry-based Fexco and Dublin-based Goodbody had different corporate cultures, but Barrett in the main helped knit things together. He is friendly with former government minister Dick Spring, who sat on the board of both AIB and Fexco, as well as Fexco founder Brian McCarthy, a former banker with AIB.
In June 2011, in a rare interview, Barrett said that an injection of fresh capital from Fexco gave Goodbody new impetus after years of going nowhere as its parent AIB battled to survive.
“There were hiring freezes and, as a consequence of that, a business goes stale,” Barrett said. “There was no new blood coming in with fresh ideas and I suppose our business, to varying degrees, would have suffered because of that.”
Goodbody’s partnership with Fexco worked well at first, but gradually both sides began to consider their options.
It helped too that having survived the crash, Goodbody was now doing well.
It was a key advisor on the €3.4 billion IPO of AIB. It worked on multiple fundraises for venture capital firm Draper Esprit. Blue-chip firms like Greencore, Applegreen, IPL and Eirgrid all worked with it. Its asset management and wealth arms were doing well.
In 2017 / 2018, a Chinese consortium first began to sniff around Goodbody. Roy Barrett’s cousin is Richard Barrett the former co-founder of Treasury Holdings. Richard Barrett has lived on-and-off in China for over a decade.
He has extensive business contacts and in February 2018 was reported to be helping “broker” a Chinese acquisition of Goodbody.
It is unclear how much, if at all, Richard Barrett assisted in the background on the first Chinese bid for Goodbody.
He did help his cousin in understanding the complexities of doing business with the Chinese in general, but the deal originated from elsewhere.
Roy Barrett visited China several times during this period to try and secure the deal. Goodbody believed it could become a platform for Chinese investors to expand from Dublin into Europe. As a bonus, having a giant Chinese backer, might allow it eclipse its old rival Davy overtime.
Ultimately however the talks between Goodbody and a consortium led by state-backed Zhong Ze Culture Investment Holdings came to nothing.
In a January 2019 statement, Goodbody said: “Both companies have concluded that the rationale for the original transaction is no longer applicable due to a proposed change in the make-up of the shareholder structure made by the acquiring group.”
With these talks ended, it was clear to both Fexco and Goodbody that a different deal needed to be done. Behind the scenes, Davy, Goodbody’s traditional rival, moved onto the pitch in late spring or early summer 2019. Kryan McLaughlin, like Barrett a Blackrock oldboy, led the talks in what would have been a crowning masterstroke towards the end of a long career at the top of Davy.
“Roy didn’t want to sell to Davy. He feared they’d wipe his team out by firing a lot of them.”
Goodbody source
Davy’s arrival triggered a sale process for the company which drew in Irish Life and Bank of China.
Bank of China was the biggest player, but Davy was playing at home.
The Irish firm put together a cash and shares offer for Goodbody, which it was sure would convince Fexco to sell to it.
“Roy didn’t want to sell to Davy. He feared they’d wipe his team out by firing a lot of them,” a Goodbody source said. “Roy is a very nice guy but he is also very determined when he puts his mind to it.”
Ultimately, Bank of China had the firepower to secure Goodbody for about €150 million. It was a great deal for Fexco, and thanks to Barrett and his senior team it was also a good payday for Goodbody staff.
Barrett himself will make an estimated €10 million from the sale when it closes. Undoubtedly he has tax and other bills to pay, but by most people’s standards, Barrett is wealthy. This is again a positive in taking on the position of chair in the FAI. He is financially secure and is putting his reputation on the line by becoming chair.
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The experience of dealing with crisis after crisis in the crash cannot but stand to Roy Barrett when dealing with the FAI.
The FAI is in trouble, but its problems are relatively manageable compared to some of the challenges Barrett has faced in his long and varied career.
He has coalface experience of dealing with crisis, financial woes, low staff morale and so on.
He stayed the course and steered Ireland’s oldest stockbroker through the crisis, at a time when well known financial services businesses were going under worldwide.
The crisis facing the FAI is deep and extremely difficult, but Barrett has demonstrated he has the skills to keep going, during the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression in 1929.
“Roy is the identikit for what you’d want in that role at this time. In character and approach he’s the antidote to the excesses of the previous regime.”
Fintan Drury
Of the ten or so former colleagues, rivals or peers The Currency spoke to, most declined to comment on-the-record. This is perhaps because they are still doing business with him, competing with him or working with him.
Fintan Drury, who has known Barrett since his school days, has been involved in Irish football for decades. He said: “Roy is the identikit for what you’d want in that role at this time. In character and approach, he’s the antidote to the excesses of the previous regime. Roy is intelligent, low-key, well mannered, collegiate and calm and he’s experienced really hard times, so no matter how perilous the FAI’s situation, there’s nothing about it that will unduly daunt him. He is also a genuine football man, he is passionate about the essentials of the game and its importance across the country. While he’s a Leeds man, he’s well aware of the need to address the domestic club game and will be moved to support new proposals that are economically sensible and make sense for the development of the game. It’s exciting that he wants the challenge as it would appear that he does.”
Barrett is friendly with former international Niall Quinn who was involved in Sunderland football club.
Quinn recently stated he had no interest in the CEO’s position, where it’s clear the new chairman’s first real test will arise. While Quinn has ruled himself out, it is unclear whether the FAI itself was considering ruling him in. There are other candidates potentially on the pitch.
FAI interim lead Paul Cooke is an accountant and experienced firefighter. It is possible he stays on as chief executive to help Barrett through the crisis.
He previously reported to another NCB veteran, Conor Killeen, who chaired the Sunday Business Post. Between them, they prevented my former employer from going bankrupt in 2013.
Cooke is undoubtedly committed to Irish football. While he’s a long-term critic of the leadership of its departed chief executive John Delaney, and a trojan worker, he would not represent a step change at the top. He does, however, thrive in a crisis and has to be considered as part of the solution.
Susan Whelan, the chief executive of Leicester City FC, is another strong candidate. She has spoken in interviews about missing living in Ireland, but she is successful in her current position and may not want a change yet. It would also be a step down from the role as CEO of the second-placed side in the FA Premier League which, for the first time in its history, won the championship only three seasons ago.
Ciaran Medlar, a partner and head of tax with accountants BDO, is another possibility. Medlar leads BDO’s Sports Advisory Unit. He has all the skills required by the FAI at this time of crisis and his approach would be equally low-key and considered as Barrett’s. They could make an extraordinarily powerful duo and would, in one fell swoop, move the FAI from something of an embarrassment to the sport’s organisation with the strongest leadership in Irish sport.
Mind you, that would also be true of a Barrett/Whelan partnership. The FAI would be foolish to cast aside Cooke’s skills too. Barrett needs to find the right chief executive to work with him and lead the salvation of the FAI. It’s a relatively urgent need. His two new independent board directors, Catherine Guy and Liz Joyce, both have good reputations.
Guy is a former managing partner of law firm Byrne Wallace, and she is now chief executive of Autolease Fleet Management. Joyce is a director of human resources at the Central Bank of Ireland. Both directors bring badly needed relevant skills to the FAI boardroom. There is still another directorship to be filled at the FAI.
Veteran civil servant Robert Watt of the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform has been linked to the role. He knows how to cut costs, is independent-minded, and would be hugely helpful in convincing the state that the FAI is going in the right direction. Last night, however there were other names from business and professional services firms being linked to the board.
The FAI has found an experienced chair, but the association needs a strong chief executive too if Irish football is to heal and emerge stronger.