The trial of four former bankers accused of a conspiracy to defraud in 2008 has reached its closing stages.

Former Anglo executives John Bowe and William McAteer and former Irish Life and Permanent executives Denis Casey and Peter Fitzpatrick have denied conspiring to defraud by misleading investors, depositors and lenders about the true health of Anglo Irish Bank.

They are accused of engaging in a dishonest scheme to make Anglo's corporate deposits look €7bn larger than they were in September 2008.

The court heard that the money was transferred to Irish Life and Permanent from Anglo Irish Bank and then transferred back to Anglo from Irish Life Assurance.

This meant the money would appear in Anglo's accounts as a corporate deposit.

Prosecuting Counsel Úna Ní Raifeartaigh began her closing speech to the jury this morning after a trial lasting 70 days.

She told the 13 jurors that this had been an extraordinary trial in many ways.

She said Anglo wanted to reach a particular target for its corporate deposits coming up to its year end in September 2008.

She said Anglo could not reach this target in the usual ways and so resorted to unusual means.

She added that the four former bankers engaged in an agreement to send money around in circles so that it would come back in to Anglo Irish Bank dressed up as a corporate deposit.

She said you could call it a circular transaction or you could call it "ping pong".

She said Anglo Irish Bank was batting €1bn over to Irish Life and Permanent. Irish Life and Permanent would pass it to its life assurance business Irish Life Assurance, who would bat it back to Anglo.

Ms Ní Raifeartaigh said Anglo was very worried about the end of year "snapshot" of its business.

The photo was going to be horrible and she said Anglo was highly conscious about it.

She said the purpose of the transactions was to mislead people who would be looking at this snapshot - investors, depositors, lenders - about the overall health of the bank.

She said it was not a question of the bank putting on its best suit for the end of year figures - it was putting on a disguise.

It was not credible for the two defendants from Irish Life and Permanent to say they did not know Anglo's intention in entering into the €7.2bn transactions, she said, adding that they were not naive, babes in the wood.

She said that even if any of the accused were not involved in authorising the transactions, the prosecution said they were guilty of conspiracy if they were involved in implementing the transactions with the intention of misleading people.

She said it was not necessary for the prosecution to show that individuals had actually suffered economic loss as a result of the scheme.

Ms Ní Raifeartaigh also told the jurors it was no defence for any of the bankers to say they had been told to do what they did by more senior people in the bank.

She told them that the attitude of the Financial Regulator, the Central Bank or the Regulatory Authority was not relevant to the issues the jurors had to decide.

She said they had to decide if this was a dishonest scheme and if there was dishonest intent behind it.

She said what the Financial Regulator thought was not of assistance in reaching their decision.

Any indifference, or acquiescence or turning a blind eye by the Regulatory Authorities did not provide the conspirators with a defence, she said.

She said there was no evidence that the Financial Regulator knew about the transactions in advance and even if he had known, this would be irrelevant.

She told the jurors they needed to put the Financial Regulator to one side in this case.

She also told them they had heard a lot about the financial crisis - but she said this could not be an excuse.

Necessity was not an excuse or a defence.

She said it may provide context but did not provide a defence.

Ms Ní Raifeartaigh said the transactions were empty and their only purpose was for the "optics" of Anglo's end of year statement.

She said the prosecution case was what happened went beyond legitimate balance sheet activity.

She said the evidence did not support the idea that this kind of activity was the norm.

Ms Ni Raifeartaigh said Anglo had approached AIB to do a similar transaction but AIB had refused. She said these transactions were "empty".

She said the jury had a role to decide whether this was a dishonest scheme done with the intention of misleading the public.

She said the prosecution case was that this went beyond normal banking activity and went into criminal activity.

She pointed to language used by Mr Bowe, saying this showed that those involved did not consider these transactions to be real corporate deposits.

She also asked the jury to consider the extent to which Mr McAteer did not remember anything, when he was questioned a year and a half after the transactions.

She will continue her closing speech to the jurors tomorrow morning.