CB goes for bumper Rs. 68 b T. bill, bond auctions

With the objective of making the most of the declining trend in interest rates, the Public Debt Department of the Central Bank has announced in total an amount of Rs. 28 billion for its weekly Treasury bill auction and a total of Rs. 40 billion for its Treasury bond auction to be held this week.

Wealth Trust Securities said an all-time high amount of Rs. 18 billion was on offer on the 364 day bill, while Rs. 2 billion and Rs. 8 billion was offered on the 91 day and 182 day bills respectively. With regard to bonds, Rs. 15 billion, Rs. 10 billion and Rs 15 billion was on offer on the four year, eight year and 15 year bond maturities respectively.



According to Wealth Trust, the announcements saw secondary market bill and bond yields increase across the board yesterday mainly on the 364 day bill from Friday’s lows of 10.80% to 11.25% and on the four year and five year bonds from Friday’s lows of 10.60% to 11.00% and 11.20% respectively.

Meanwhile in money markets, overnight call money and repo rates continued to remain steady to average 9.84% and 8.93% respectively as market liquidity reversed back to a surplus of Rs. 3.91 billion yesterday.





Meanwhile, in forex markets yesterday, the rupee remained stable at levels of Rs. 127.35-Rs.127.40 as volumes traded were rather moderate. The total USD/LKR traded volume for the previous day (4 January 2013) stood at US$ 69.94 million.