Secondary market bond yields dip further ahead of weekly auction

Tuesday, 24 December 2013 00:01 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

By Wealth Trust Securities Buying interest saw secondary market bond yields dip further yesterday ahead of today’s weekly Treasury bill auction. At today’s auction, the total offered amount will increase to a 41-week high of Rs. 16 billion which will consist of Rs. 1 billion each on the 91-day and 182-day maturities and Rs. 14 billion on the 364-day maturity respectively. At last week’s auction, weighted averages (WAvgs) on all three maturities declined for a 13th consecutive week to 7.73%, 8.19% and 8.53% respectively. In secondary market trading, the liquid two five-year maturities (i.e. 01.04.2018 & 15.08.18) dominated activity yesterday as its yields dipped by 20 basis points (bp) and 18 bp respectively intraday, to lows of 9.70% and 9.75% against its highs of 9.90% and 9.93%. Furthermore buying interest on secondary market bills saw the 364-day bill changing hands at levels of 8.35%, which was 18 bp lower than its previous week’s WAvg. The overnight call money and repo rates remained steady to average 7.71% and 7.02% respectively as surplus liquidity stood at Rs. 26.81 billion yesterday. The Open Market Operations (OMO) department of Central Bank was seen mopping up an amount of Rs. 9.05 billion on a four-day basis at a WAvg of 7.17% while a further Rs. 17.76 billion was seen been deposited at its window rate of 6.50%. Rupee remains stable In Forex markets, the rupee closed the day mostly unchanged at Rs. 130.70/72 yesterday. The total USD/LKR volume for the previous day (20 December 2013) stood at $ 77.05 million. Some of the forward dollar rates that prevailed in the market were 1-Month: Rs. 131.17; 3-Months: Rs. 132.21 and 6-Months: Rs. 133.91.