Treasury to raise P160B from sale of bills, bonds in March

The Bureau of the Treasury will offer P160 billion in bills and bonds in March to take advantage of excess domestic liquidity even as yields are expected to rise alongside rising rates of US treasuries.

In a memorandum to all government securities eligible dealers on Tuesday, National Treasurer Rosalia de Leon said P20 billion each in short-dated treasury bills will be auctioned on March 1, 8, 15, 22 and 29.

The weekly treasury bills offering will still be made up of P5 billion each in the benchmark 91-day and 182-day plus P10 billion in 364-day securities.

The Treasury also plans to raise P60 billion from the P30 billion each in bonds to be offered on March 9 and 23.

The first treasury bond auction in March will be for a seven-year debt paper and the next will be for 10-year IOUs.

The longer bond tenors augured well with interest rates inching up here and abroad, particularly in the United States.US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen last Monday said they plan to issue longer-term securities to take advantage of higher yields.

Robert Carnell, Asia-Pacific regional research head at Dutch financial giant ING, said in a report on Monday that rising US treasury yields were not necessarily bad as large parts of the real economy would benefit.

“Higher yields are also an indication of expectations of a stronger macroeconomy, where it makes sense to lend to profitable companies and where it is possible to make a return from doing so,” Carnell said.

—Ben O. de Vera