AIB's former managing director says he was "surprised" at the wide-ranging nature of the bank guarantee.
Donal Forde has told the Banking Inquiry he thought Anglo and Irish Nationwide would be "taken out of the market" and the guarantee only given to the last four.
However, Forde said he wouldn't criticise the wide-ranging nature of the guarantee - because it may have been exactly what was needed.
“I can understand the view that a more sweeping and radical response often has the impact of giving the market confidence and sort of dealing with the issue decisively there and then,” he said.
“Overkill sometimes is good to deal with market negativity, perhaps that was the mindset, so I would be slow to criticise, I wasn’t there,” he added.
Forde has joined the bank's former chairman Dermot Gleeson in telling the inquiry he "regrets" the role he played in forcing the bank to be nationalised.
The Banking Inquiry has heard further evidence that Brian Lenihan wanted to nationalise Anglo and Irish Nationwide on the night of the guarantee.
The former chairman of AIB, Dermot Gleeson, says Mr Lenihan personally told him he thought the two banks should not have been guaranteed.
Mr Gleeson was one of four bankers in Government Buildings on the night of the guarantee, but says he did not have any role in the final decision.
He says Mr Lenihan told him later he would have preferred a different outcome.
Earlier, Mr Gleeeson said the bank lent too much money to individual developers - and that he was sorry for his role in the collapse.
