Article by:
Joann Villanueva
MANILA – The Bureau of the Treasury (BTr) fully awarded on Monday its Treasury bill (T-bill) offerings after the debt papers’ interest rates fell.
The average rate of the 91-day paper slipped to 0.969 percent, the 182-day to 1.121 percent, and the 364-day to 1.468 percent.
These were at 1.075 percent, 1.269 percent, and 1.600 percent for the three-month, six-month, and one-year papers during the auction last January 3.
The BTr offered each tenor for PHP5 billion and the auction committee made a full award across the board.
Total tenders for the three-month paper reached PHP23.702 billion while it amounted to PHP24.98 billion for the six-month paper and PHP24.9 billion for the one-year paper.
“Full award with high bid to cover and lower rates offered as December (2021) inflation dropped to 3.6 percent,” National Treasurer Rosalia de Leon told journalists in a Viber message.
Data from the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) showed the deceleration of the domestic rate of price increases last December from the previous month’s 4.2 percent.
This resulted in an average inflation of 4.5 percent, higher than the government’s 2-4 percent target band.
De Leon said redemption of around PHP25 billion worth of securities for this week as well as investors’ preference for short-term debt papers also contributed to the strong demand for the T-bills this week.
“Markets flocking to short tenors given rising cases and Fed imminent aggressive rate hikes,” she added.
For one, the domestic coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) cases have been rising.
The Department of Health (DOH) on Monday reported 33,169 additional new Covid-19 infections, higher than the 28,707 in the previous day. (PNA)
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