On Thursday, May 6, the Governing Council of the ECB decided to keep the interest rate on its MROs unchanged at one per cent. Interest rates on the marginal lending facility and the deposit facility were also left unchanged, at 1.75 per cent and 0.25 per cent, respectively.

On Monday, May 3, the ECB announced its weekly MRO. This auction, which was conducted last Tuesday, attracted bids for €90.32 billion from euro area eligible counterparties, € 14.7 billion more 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 the current ECB policy.

In the dmestic primary market for Treasury Bills, the Treasury invited tenders for 182-day bills maturing on November 5.

Bids for €75.85 million were submitted, with the Treasury allotting €16 million.

Since €23.78 million worth of bills matured during the week, the outstanding balance of Treasury Bills decreased by €7.78 million to €534.88 million. The resulting from the auction was 0.686 per cent, i.e. 8.9 basis points less than that on bills with a similar tenor issued on April 16 and a new record low. It represented a bid price of 99.6544 per 100 nominal.

Treasury Bill trading on the Malta Stock Exchange amounted to €1.29 million during the week, with € 0.01 million trades being conducted by the Central Bank of Malta in its role as market maker. Concurrently, off-exchange transactions amounting to €1.60 million were also transacted by the Central Bank of Malta.

Today, the Treasury will invite tenders for 91-day bills maturing on August 13 and 273-day bills maturing on February 11.