Decrease in outstanding Treasury bills

In the domestic primary market for Treasury bills, the Treasury invited tenders for 91-day bills maturing on July 15, 2011 and 273-day bills maturing on January 13, 2012. Bids of €40.41 million were submitted for the 91-day bills, with the Treasury accepting €3.92 million, and €40.11 million worth of bids were submitted for the 273-day bills, with the Treasury accepting €18.69 million. Since €41 million worth of bills matured during the week, the outstanding balance of Treasury bills decreased by €18.39 million, to stand at €375.69 million.

The yield from the 91-day bill auction was 1.018%, i.e. 0.1 basis points higher than on bills with a similar tenor issued on April 8, 2011, representing a bid price of 99.7433 per 100 nominal. The yield from the 273-day bill auction was 1.56%, i.e. 39.9 basis points higher than on bills with a similar tenor issued on January 14, 2011, representing a bid price of 98.8308 per 100 nominal. 

During the week under review, trading on the Malta Stock Exchange amounted to €1.93 million, conducted by private brokers. 

On Tuesday, the Treasury invited tenders for 92-day bills maturing on July 22, 2011.

On Monday, April 11, the ECB announced its weekly Main Refinancing Operation. The auction was conducted on Tuesday, April 12, and attracted bids from euro area eligible counterparties of €94.13 billion, €9.60 billion higher 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 1.25%, in accordance with current ECB policy.

On Tuesday, April 12, the ECB conducted a Special Term Refinancing Operation (STRO) with a maturity of 28 days. This attracted bids of €83.69 billion, which were allotted in full at a fixed rate equivalent to the prevailing main refinancing rate of 1.25%, also in accordance with current ECB policy.

On Tuesday, April 12, the ECB conducted an auction for a seven-day fixed-term deposit intended to absorb €77 billion.  The operation was designed to sterilise the effect of purchases made under the Securities Markets Programme and settled by the previous Friday, April 8.  The auction was carried out at a variable rate, with euro area eligible counterparties allowed to place up to two bids at a maximum rate of 1.25%. It attracted bids amounting to €102.56 billion, with the ECB allotting €77 billion or 75.08% of the total amount bid for. The marginal rate on the auction was set at 1.12%, with the weighted average rate at 1.05%.

Also on Tuesday, April 12, which was the last day of the reserve deposit maintenance period, the ECB conducted an overnight Fine-tuning Liquidity Absorbing Operation at a variable rate, with counterparties allowed to place up to two bids at a maximum rate of 1.00%.  The operation attracted bids of €81.34 billion, with the ECB accepting €78.87 billion or 96.96% of the amount bid for. The marginal rate on the operation was set at 0.80%, while the weighted average allotment rate was 0.79%.

On Wednesday, April 13, the ECB conducted a seven-day US dollar funding operation through collateralised lending in conjunction with the US Federal Reserve.  This operation was carried out at a fixed rate of 1.09% and once more, no bids were placed by euro area eligible counterparties.