Treasury bill rates fall further

Treasury bill rates further fell across the board on Monday, allowing the Bureau of the Treasury to sell all P20 billion it offered.The Treasury sold P6 billion in benchmark 91-day debt paper at an average of 3.072 percent, down from 3.115 percent last week.

It also awarded P6 billion in 182-day IOUs at 3.42 percent, down from 3.461 percent.

As for the 364-day treasury bills, P8 billion were issued at an annual rate of 3.836 percent, down from 3.908 percent previously.In a statement, the Treasury said the securities were also awarded at rates below those in the secondary market.

Across the three tenors, bids totaled P78.3 billion, making the auction almost four times oversubscribed the P20-billion offering.

As such, National Treasurer Rosalia de Leon told reporters after the auction that the Treasury opened its tap facility to sell over-the-counter another up to P8 billion in 364-day T-bills, given strong demand.

De Leon attributed the robust demand for the longest treasury bill tenor to investors’ flight toward safer havens, including T-bonds, amid lingering concerns over the COVID-19 outbreak.

The same concerns over COVID-19 had been the reason why the Treasury was still “very tepid” and monitor­ing the market as far as the planned dollar-denominated glo­bal bond sale was concerned.

The declining T-bill rates, meanwhile, were attributed by De Leon to Fitch’s upgrade to positive of its credit rating outlook for the Philippines last week, as well as Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas Governor Benjamin Diokno’s recent pronouncement that another interest rate cut might come during the second quarter. INQ