Banks make beeline for T-bills
The Bureau of the Treasury sold all P15 billion in T-bills it offered Monday amid robust demand for short-dated instruments.
The Treasury awarded P6 billion in 91-day IOUs at an average rate of 2.103 percent, down 4.5 basis points from 2.148 percent in the previous auction. Investors tendered P25.08 billion for the three-month T-bills maturing on Sept. 6.
As for the P5 billion in 182-day debt paper, the Treasury accepted a 2.456-percent rate, 3.8 basis points lower than 2.494 percent previously. Tenders for the six-month T-bills maturing on Dec. 6 reached P14.677 billion.
The Treasury also sold P4 billion in 364-day government securities at 2.85 percent, an annual rate 1.5 basis points higher than the previous auction’s 2.835 percent. Bids for the one-year IOUs maturing on June 6 next year amounted to P12.069 billion.
In all, a total of P51.826 billion were tendered for the P15-billion offering.
“We had a good auction given that liquidity is on the short end of the curve,” National Treasurer Rosalia V. De Leon told reporters.
“We see that rates are also reasonable. While there is the expectation of a possibility of a June rate hike [by the US Federal Reserve], still, the Bangko Sentral and even the consensus of economists [was that] domestic inflation will remain within target—in fact, it might even be a tad lower than what we had in the previous month,” De Leon added.
The Department of Finance sees inflation slightly easing to 3.2 percent year-on-year in May. —BEN O. DE VERA
