Secondary bond markets make positive start as activity increases significantly

Tuesday, 30 April 2013 00:34 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

By Wealth Trust Securities

In contrast to last week, activity in secondary bonds markets picked up significantly yesterday mainly surrounding the two liquid five year maturities (i.e. 01.04.2018 and 15.08.2018).

These two maturities opened the day at levels of 11.37% and dipped to an intraday day low of 11.31% on the back of buying interest ahead of the bond auction result announcements. However subsequent to the announcement, yields picked up once again to close the day mostly unchanged in comparison to its previous day’s closing levels. In addition, a limited amount of activity was witnessed on the 8 year maturity as well at levels of 11.75%.

Meanwhile in money markets, as surplus liquidity remained high at Rs 25.05 Bn yesterday, overnight call money and repo rates remained steady once again to average 9.44% and 8.58% respectively. The Open Market Operations (OMO) department of Central Bank drained out an amount of Rs.22.38 Bn at a weighted average of 8.36% by way of an overnight Repo auction in addition to draining out a further of Rs.1 Bn for a period of 38 days at a weighted average of 9.05% by way of outright sales of Treasury bills.

Rupee remains steady

The dollar rupee rate remained mostly unchanged within the range of Rs.126.80 – 126.85 yesterday. The total USD/LKR volume for the previous day stood at US $ 39.04 million. Given below are some forward dollar rates that prevailed in the market, 1 Month – 127.88; 3 Months- 129.85 and 6 Months- 132.78.