Money Market Rates Surge by 7.13% as T-Bills Yields Shrink to 12.77%

By Modupe Gbadeyanka

The treasury bills market remained relatively quiet yesterday with no significant volumes traded recorded.

This was as the market players anticipate increased supply of T-bills via the NTB and OMO auctions on Wednesday and Thursday respectively.

Consequently, the average treasury bills yields slightly went down by 0.07 percent to 12.77 percent at the end of market on Monday.

The yields are expected to remain relatively stable at these levels on Tuesday, barring a significant decline in the net system liquidity.

Meanwhile, Business Post reports that the average money market rates broadly increased on Monday by 7.13 percent to close at 12.21 percent.

Specifically, the Overnight (OVN) rate rose to 12.58 percent from 5.33 percent in the previous session, while the Open Buy Back (OBB) rate jumped to 11.83 percent from 4.83 percent.

The growth in the rates came on the back of a significant decline in system liquidity by about N380 billion, largely due to outflows for retail forex funding by banks in the previous session.

Banks also had to provision for their wholesale forex bids yesterday, consequently exerting some pressure on rates.

“We expect rates to trend slightly lower today as there are no significant funding pressures expected,” analysts at Zedcrest Research said in their daily market report.