By Dipo Olowookere
About N236 billion was offered to the Debt Management Office (DMO) by investors for the purchase of the N30 billion bonds auctioned by the federal government on Wednesday.
The FGN bonds were put up for sale by the DMO on behalf of the Nigerian government on Wednesday in its monthly bond auction.
As part of ways to raise funds for budget deficits, the federal government carries out a monthly sale of the papers to investors at the primary market.
These notes are auctioned at maturities determined by the debt office, with proceeds used to finance some capital projects in the budget signed for the fiscal year by the President.
During the exercise, the DMO offered for sale the bonds in two maturities of 15 years and 25 years at N15 billion each.
However, details of the sale showed that investors staked N169.2 billion on the 15-year note and as the debt office said, this came from a total of 99 bids for the 12.50% FGN MAR 2035 re-opening bond.
At the end of the bids, it allotted N20.0 billion for the competitive bids at a coupon rate of 4.97 per cent and N2.5 billion for the non-competitive bids at the same rate.
For the 25-year re-opening paper tagged 9.80% FGN JUL 2045, the debt office offered for sale N15 billion as earlier stated but it got subscriptions worth N66.7 billion during the exercise in 67 bids.
However, when it was to allocate the notes to subscribers, the DMO sold N25.0 billion for the competitive bids and N2.5 billion for the non-competitive subscriptions. The note cleared at an interest rate of 6.00 per cent.
Business Post reports that settlement for the successful bids during the exercise was made by the federal government today, Friday, October 23, 2020.
As at the time the debt office sold the 15-year bond on Wednesday, it had an actual maturity of 14 years and 5 months, while the 25-year paper had an actual tenor of 24 years and 9 months.
Adedapo Adesanya 
Modupe Gbadeyanka