CBN to Sell N133.8b T-Bills This Week as N174b Bills Mature

By Modupe Gbadeyanka

This week, at the primary markets, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) will auction treasury bills worth N133.8 billion.

According to the Nigerian treasury bills issue programme for fourth quarter of 2017 released by the apex bank recently, the sale will take place on Thursday, October 19, 2017.

A breakdown of the forthcoming exercise revealed that the CBN will auction 91-day bills worth N32.40 billion, 182-day bills worth N35.00 billion and 364-day bills worth N66.39 billion.

Treasury bills are short-term debt instruments issued by the Federal Government through the central bank to provide short term funding for the government. They are sold at a discount and redeemed at par.

To buy treasury bills from the primary market, investors have to approach their banks requesting for a form.

Twice a month, the CBN issues treasury bills to help the government fund its budget deficit, support commercial lenders in managing liquidity and curb inflation.

Also this week, Business Post gathered that there would be maturing T-Bills and Open Market Operations (OMO) totalling N174.33 billion.

A breakdown of this showed that the maturing bills are 91-day bills worth N32.40 billion, 154-day bills worth N0.096 billion, 163-day bills worth N0.22 billion, 167-day bills worth N0.48 billion, 181-day bills worth N0.20 billion, 182-day bills worth N25.51 billion, 358-day bills worth N49.04 billion and 364-day bills worth N66.39 billion.