DUBLIN--Granting euro-zone countries access to the bloc's new bailout fund to retroactively finance ailing banks may be of only limited benefit to Ireland's government, analysts said Friday.

Ministers meeting in Luxembourg Thursday left the door open to the possibility that euro-zone countries like Ireland, that have pumped in huge sums to keep their banks from collapse over the last five years, could retroactively tap the European Stability Mechanism.

But the strict criteria set by euro-zone finance ministers on Thursday for access to the ESM, including capping the amounts available for all euro-area banks at 60 billion euros ($79.4 billion) raises serious doubts whether Ireland could realistically hope to tap fund at all, said Dermot O'Leary, chief economist at Goodbody Stockbrokers. "I am very skeptical that there is support in core Europe for retrospective financing," he said.

Ryan McGrath, senior bond trader at Cantor Fitzgerald Ireland, said that the potential funds available for direct bank capitalization was just too small.

Ireland has long waged a campaign to persuade its fellow euro-area governments to allow it tap the ESM to refinance as much as possible of its huge bank-rescue sums, saying that the principle of potential retroactive capitalization of banks would be significant in its measures to deal with the crisis.

The Irish finance ministry gave a guarded welcome Friday. Had the principle of retroactive capitalization not been included, "it would have been a bad day for Ireland," Brian Hayes, deputy finance minister told Irish broadcaster RTE Radio. Ireland would assess whether to apply for retrospective funding for its banks through the ESM, but only when the details are worked through, he said.

Ireland pumped in over EUR30 billion into Allied Irish Banks PLC (ALBK.DB), Bank of Ireland PLC (BIR.DB) and Permanent TSB (IL0.DB) to keep them from collapse during the crisis. The lenders continue to be loss-making and struggle with large amounts of troubled home and business loans, a legacy of the country's deep property market crash.

Ireland clinched a deal with the European Central Bank in February for the government to refinance a large chunk of approximately EUR32 billion the country injected into so-called dead banks, including Anglo Irish Bank Corp., by issuing Irish long term bonds.

The IMF, in its latest review of Ireland's bailout, Wednesday urged the euro-area authorities to provide Ireland will help for its legacy bank debts, saying the ESM remained the best way of doing this.

Write to Eamon Quinn at eamon.quinn@dowjones.com

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