On Thursday, April 5, the ECB announced its weekly Main Refinancing Operation. The auction was conducted on Tuesday, April 10, and attracted bids from euro area eligible counterparties of €55.36 billion, €7.26 billion lower than the amount bid for in the previous week.
The bid amount was allotted in full at a fixed rate equivalent to the prevailing main refinancing rate of one per cent, in accordance with current ECB policy.
On the same day, the ECB conducted a Special Term Refinancing Operation with a maturity of 28 days.
This attracted bids of €11.39 billion which were allotted in full at a fixed rate equivalent to the prevailing main refinancing rate of one per cent, also in accordance with the current ECB policy.
Also last Tuesday, the ECB also conducted an auction for a seven-day fixed-term deposit intended to absorb €214 billion. This operation is designed to sterilise the effect of purchases made under the Securities Markets Programme that were settled but had not yet matured by the previous Friday, April 6.
The auction was carried out at a variable rate, with euro area eligible counterparties allowed to place up to four bids at a maximum rate of one per cent. It attracted bids amounting to €365.27 billion, with the ECB allotting €214 billion, or 58.59 per cent, of the total bid amount. The marginal rate on the auction was set at 0.26 per cent, with the weighted average rate also at 0.26 per cent.
On Wednesday, April 11, the ECB conducted a seven-day US dollar funding operation through collateralised lending in conjunction with the US Federal Reserve. This operation attracted bids of $1.28 billion, which were allotted in full at a fixed rate of 0.63 per cent.
Domestic Treasury bill market
In the domestic primary market for Treasury bills, the Treasury invited tenders for 273-day and 364-day bills maturing on January 11 and April 12, 2013 respectively. Bids of €8 million were submitted for the 273-day bills, while bids of €4 million were submitted for the 364-day bills, with the Treasury accepting the full amount in both tenors. Since €27.41 million worth of bills matured during the week, the outstanding balance of Treasury bills decreased by €15.41 million, to stand at €202.94 million.
The yield from the 273-day bill auction was 1.307 per cent, i.e. 0.9 basis point higher than on bills with a similar tenor issued on April 5, representing a bid price of 99.0186 per 100 nominal. The yield from the 364-day bill auction was 1.40 per cent, i.e. 299 basis points lower than on bills with a similar tenor issued way back, on November 23, 2007, representing a bid price of 98.6042 per 100 nominal.
During the week under review, there was no trading on the Malta Stock Exchange.
Today, the Treasury will invite tenders for 91-day and 182-day bills maturing on July 20 and October 19 respectively.