IDA Ireland has said that 6,570 net jobs were created by IDA companies last year.

Imagine alien economists landing from another planet to assess the state of the Irish economy. (Don’t laugh, for many Irish that is what the last few years have felt like, as troika economists – highly respected and capable but with very different frames of reference to most Irish people – have visited our shores). What would those alien economists say?
                   
The first thing they’d have difficulty understanding is why an island nation of 6.5 million people on the edge of Europe has been split into two separate tax, currency and legal systems.

Online crafts company Etsy are among six digital companies that are set to create up to 150 new jobs for Ireland, according to the Herald.

Austerity certainly had an impact on Ireland, and the sciences weren’t spared from the influence. As part of austerity measures, Ireland chose to abolish - or absorb into another position - the role of the chief science adviser, a position that had been around since 2005, in late 2012.

Dublin headquarters of the Anglo Irish Bank Corp., which has been called the world’s worst bank, may be converted into a coffee shop.

Canadian working visas were snapped up in record time by thousands of hopeful Irish immigrants last week.

Irish leader Enda Kenny has announced a deal with the European Central Bank which will convert the former Anglo Irish bank debt of €28 billion into long term bonds. The interest rate will drop from 8 per cent to 3 per cent with much longer to pay.

Last year Irish good exports hit the highest level since 2002, latest figures show.

Irish house prices fell in value at the second-fastest rate in Europe last year – and five times faster than the European Union average.

The former CFO of Anglo Irish Bank has warned that Ireland’s promissory note deal with the European Central Bank could be ‘illegal.'

The average age of Irish emigrants has risen according to new statistics which show that thirty-somethings are leading the exodus from the economically crippled country.

The Irish media company, Independent News & Media PLC, has sold off its newspaper group in South Africa for $227 million.

More than 4,000 representatives of 70,000 nurses, Gardai (police), firefighters and prison officers have signaled that emergency personnel are prepared to take industrial action to protect their pay.

Irish newspapers are falling in circulation.

The bank guarantee deal that collapsed the Celtic Tiger economy will expire at the end of March.
Ireland’s Finance Minister Michael Noonan has announced that the infamous scheme will cease to exist at midnight on March 28.

The Irish government has pledged to seek no further cuts to public service pay if a deal thrashed out over the weekend with union leaders is accepted by its members.

The newest figures from the Central Statistics Office reveals an increase of 4.4% in passengers from North America to Ireland between November 2012 and January 2013. In comparison to the same time period last year, this is an additional 52,900 trips within a very small time frame.

The Irish government is about to give the green light to banks to repossess the homes of distressed mortgage holders.

As part of their literature and humanities programme the Irish Arts Center will play host to two nights of political cabaret. The evenings will feature Irish economist David McWilliams, President Obama’s "Car Czar" and MSNBC Morning Joe economic analyst Steven Rattner and Executive Director of the Northern Manhattan Coalition for Immigrant's Rights Angela Fernandez as well as RTE's Late Late Show House Band front-man Paddy Cullivan.

Ministers are making encouraging noises about the Irish economy and the government has ended the infamous bank guarantee which landed the Irish tax payers with a bill of 64 billion euro to shore up the country’s ‘casino’ banking system.

An investor is needed urgently to save the Sunday Business Post after a Dublin court allowed the newspaper to go into examinership.

A whopping 46 percent of people in full time employment in Ireland are considering emigrating, according to the latest study.

Childbirth is booming in Ireland – the country now has the highest percentage of children in the expanded European Union.

The Sunday Independent Rich List 2013 has revealed that Ireland's 300 wealthiest people have a combined net worth of more than €66bn, or nearly $86bn, an amount larger than Ecuador's GDP.

E Cork Foundation, a new not-for-profit funding organization established by a group of leading business and public figures to help drive social and economic growth throughout the Cork region, was launched last week at the Port of Cork, Custom House Street in Cork by Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine Simon Coveney and the chairman of the Cork Foundation Strategic Board, Sean O’Driscoll, the chairman and CEO of Glen Dimplex.

Ireland's National Asset Management Agency (NAMA) the agency created by the Irish government to address the serious problems which arose in Ireland’s banking sector,  has reportedly hired the Chicago-based Jones Lang LaSalle Inc. to seek buyers for the $93 million debt on the failed Chicago Spire development.

Renowned businessman and philanthropist Warren Buffett has reportedly sent a few of his top aides to Ireland to meet the Irish Minister for Energy, Pat Rabbitte, to discuss the possible sale of State assets.
 
"Two meetings were held with different representatives of the Berkshire Hathaway group. In both cases these were introductory meetings organized at the request of Berkshire Hathaway," a government source told the Sunday Independent.
 
Bord Gais Energy, Ireland’s national gas company, is on the block for an estimated price of  $1.3 billion dollars.
 
Bord Gais is one of several government companies that are up for grabs.  Others include Coillte the Irish forestry organization) and the license for the National Lottery.
 
Buffett has been burnt by Irish investments in the past.  In 2008, he invested $318.5m in a pair of Irish banks but when shares tanked that investment decreased in value to $35m.

Ryanair CEO Michael O'Leary is a fan of the Boeing aircraft company. In fact the Irish airline magnet just purchased 175 of Boeing's next generation 737 jets for $15.6 billion.

The boss at bailed out Bank of Ireland was paid over $1.2million in 2012 – despite the bank reporting a loss of almost $3billion.

A local authority in Ireland is considering dimming public lights in a desperate attempt to save money in the current economic crisis.

An Irish government minister has claimed working mums will have to give up their jobs and look after their children if they want mortgage debt relief under a new scheme.

According to the Central Statistics Office’s overseas travel bulletin, the number of trips into Ireland has increased over a three month period, showing a rise in flights to Ireland from North America while trips by British residents have continued to decline.

Irish property baron Sean Dunne, resident in the U.S. for the past several years, filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy in Connecticut on Good Friday, but is insistent that his financial woes did not contribute to the collapse of the Celtic Tiger economy.