Bond market remains dull ahead of weekly bill auction

By Wealth Trust Securities

The dull sentiment in the secondary bond market continued yesterday ahead of the weekly Treasury bill auction due today. Trades were witnessed on the 15.03.25 and the short-term maturity of 15.05.23 at levels of 11.01% and 9.20% respectively while secondary bill maturities of 25 March, 6 May and June (i.e. 3 and 10 June) changed hands at levels of 7.25% to 7.26%, 8.40% and 8.65% to 8.70% respectively. 

The weekly bill auction will see a total volume of Rs. 80 billion on offer. This will consist of Rs. 30 billion on the 91-day maturity and Rs. 25 billion each on the 182-day and 364-day maturities. At last week’s auction, weighted average rates on the 91-day and 364-day maturities decreased by 02 basis points each to 8.50% and 8.57% respectively while the weighted average rate on the 182-day remained steady at 8.54%. The total secondary market Treasury bond/bill transacted volume for 21 February was Rs. 4.63 billion.    In money markets, the overnight net liquidity deficit was registered at Rs. 622.32 billion yesterday as an amount of Rs. 64.08 billion was deposited at Central Banks Standard Deposit Facility Rate (SDFR) of 5.50% against an amount of Rs. 686.40 billion withdrawn from Central Banks Standard Lending Facility Rate (SLFR) of 6.50%. The weighted average rates on overnight Call money and REPO stood at 6.49% and 6.50% respectively.

Forex market 

In the forex market, limited trades on the USD/LKR spot contracts was seen at a level of Rs. 203.00 yesterday while the overall market remained inactive. 

The total USD/LKR traded volume for 21 February was $ 17.09 million.   

(References: Central Bank of Sri Lanka, Bloomberg E-Bond trading platform, Money broking companies)