Now I would like to turn to the changes in the country’s monetary arrangements culminating in our entry to the euro. Monetary and exchange rate policy In the monetary sphere, since the introduction of the Irish pound in the late 1920s, Ireland maintained a one-for-one link with sterling for more than fifty years with no exchange controls between the two countries.
This reflected the fact, inter alia, that Britain was (and still is) our largest single trading partner. Until well into the 1960s, the London financial markets were used extensively by Irish financial institutions. London served as an inter-bank market and large sterling liquid assets were held there by Irish banks.