You know something strange is afoot when Michael O’Leary spends €500,000 of shareholder money campaigning on behalf of Brussels bureaucrats , whom Ryanair’s penny-pinching chief executive more usually calls “idiots”. Ireland’s second referendum on Europe’s Lisbon treaty has become an emotional affair. But for investors the implications lie elsewhere.

Polls suggest a Yes result is likely, although not assured. It is a toss up between anger and fear. Anger over bank bail-outs, corruption and the recession could provoke a protest No targeted at an unpopular government; but fears that a No might destabilise the economy and turn Dublin into Reykjavik-on-Liffey push the other way.