The Central Bank of Nigeria reduced the stop rate on its one-year treasury bill at Wednesday’s primary market auction after investors submitted overwhelming bids, reflecting sustained appetite for longer-dated government securities.
Auction results showed total subscriptions of about N3.62tn against the N700bn offered across the three maturities. The strongest demand came from the 364-day bill, which attracted N3.38tn in bids for an offer size of N500bn, representing an oversubscription of nearly seven times.
Despite the strong demand, the CBN allotted about N1.25tn across the 91-day, 182-day and 364-day instruments, with more than N1.02tn allocated to the one-year paper alone, which is well above the amount initially offered.
The stop rate on the 364-day bill fell to 17.35 per cent from 17.66 per cent recorded at the previous auction, a decline of 31 basis points. Bid rates for the tenor ranged between 16.98 per cent and 20.00 per cent, reflecting investors’ willingness to accept lower yields in exchange for locking in longer-term returns.