BTr hikes T-bill award as yields drop on BSP bets

THE GOVERNMENT hiked its award of the Treasury bills (T-bills) it offered on Monday as rates dropped across all tenors, with the market pricing in further cuts by the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) amid below-target inflation last month.

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The Bureau of the Treasury (BTr) raised P28.6 billion from the T-bills it auctioned off on Monday, higher than the P25-billion plan.

The offer was nearly four times oversubscribed, with total bids reaching P98.259 billion. However, this was lower than the P116.316 billion in tenders recorded on June 2.

The strong demand prompted the BTr to double its acceptance of noncompetitive bids for the 364-day T-bills to P7.2 billion, it said in a statement.

It added that it made a full award as the average rates for the T-bills were all lower than those fetched at the previous week's auction.

Broken down, the Treasury borrowed the programmed P8 billion via the 91-day T-bills on Monday as tenders for the tenor reached P20.23 billion. The three-month paper was quoted at an average rate of 5.451%, 0.1 basis point (bp) lower than the 5.452% seen in the previous auction. Tenders accepted by the BTr carried yields of 5.424% to 5.469%.

The government likewise made a full P8-billion award of the 182-day securities it auctioned off as bids amounted to P38.58 billion.