Kaupthing Bank loan book

Kaupthing was one of the Icelandic banks taken over by the country's Financial Supervisory Authority during the 2008 banking collapse; it came under state control on 9 October 2008. The leaked document, titled 'Presentation of large exposures > €45 million', was presented to the bank's board on 25 September 2008. It runs to 210 pages and analyses 205 borrowers — companies and individuals — each owing between €45 million and €1.25 billion. We noted that many of the loans went to insiders and were unsecured.

Icelandic reporting on the document described very large loans to the bank's principal shareholders and their companies, including the investment company Exista, a major Kaupthing shareholder. Iceland's prime minister, Jóhanna Sigurðardóttir, said afterwards that the government was looking at whether to review the bank-secrecy law (AFP).

On Saturday 1 August 2009, minutes before its 7pm news, the national broadcaster RÚV was served with an injunction obtained by Kaupthing preventing it from reporting the document. RÚV instead displayed the address of our page carrying the document.

I did not identify our source; our page gives a release date of 30 July 2009, while the Reykjavík Grapevine reported the leak on 29 July. Within 24 hours Kaupthing's lawyers sent us a legal threat, which we published. The injunction against RÚV was issued by the Reykjavík District Commissioner.

Kaupthing's objection rested on Iceland's banking-secrecy law (AFP). The injunction was subsequently lifted following public criticism, as recorded on our page and in later Icelandic reporting.