Secondary market bond yields decrease further ahead of weekly bill auction

By Wealth Trust Securities

Secondary market bond yields continued to decrease yesterday, with the liquid maturities of 01.03.21, 01.08.21, 15.12.21, 15.05.23 and 15.05.30 trading at levels of 10.15% to 10.20%, 10.25%, 10.20% to 10.22%, 10.45% to 10.50% and 10.80% to 10.81% respectively, against the previous day’s closing levels of 10.23/30, 10.30/40, 10.25/30, 10.50/60 and 10.85/95. 

Furthermore, maturities of 15.10.18 and 01.09.23 were seen changing hands at levels of 9.80% and 10.53% to 10.57% respectively.

This week’s Treasury bill primary auction to be held today will have on offer a total amount of Rs. 18 billion, consisting of Rs. 10 billion of the 182 day maturity and Rs. 8 billion of the 364 day maturity. The weighted averages at last week’s auction increased by 10 and 11 basis points respectively to 9.27% and 9.65% respectively while all bids received for the 91 day maturity were rejected.

The total secondary market Treasury bond/bill transacted volumes for 25 August 2017 was Rs. 11.40 billion.

Meanwhile in money markets, the overnight call money and repo rates averaged at 8.44% and 8.37% respectively as the net surplus liquidity in the system stood at Rs. 39.8 billion. The Open Market Operations (OMO) Department of the Central Bank of Sri Lanka drained out an amount of Rs. 15.14 Billion on an overnight basis at a weighted average of 7.27%.

Rupee remains mostly unchanged  

The USD/LKR rate on spot contracts remained mostly unchanged yesterday to close the day at Rs. 152.90/95.

The total USD/LKR traded volume for the 25 August 2017 was $ 70.50 million.

Some of the forward USD/LKR rates that prevailed in the market were one month - 153.55/75; three months - 155.55/75 and six months - 158.20/35.