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THE NATIONAL TREASURY Management Agency has auctioned €500 million in short-term government debt on the international financial markets for a better yield than expected.
Conducted on the Bloomberg Auction System, the three-month Treasury Bills fetched a yield of 1.8 per cent – beating the 2 per cent expected. The offer was oversubscribed, as anticipated.
Minister for Finance Michael Noonan has welcomed the successful auction as a “very important milestone on Ireland’s continuing path to recovery”.
He claimed today’s auction shows that the markets have “reacted positively” to the government’s economic programme “and the decision taken at last week’s [eurozone] summit to break the negative links between the sovereign and the banks”.
“The Government is focused on emerging from the programme and returning to the markets next year,” the minister said after the sale. “Today’s return to the Treasury bill market is a small but a very important first step in this regard and we will continue to take the necessary measures to fully implement our programme and reduce our deficit in line with commitments.”
Prepared
“It’s very rare that you would go to the market for a failed auction,” Peter Browne from the Institute of Financial Training has told RTÉ’s Today with Pat Kenny.
However, Browne cautioned that selling a three-month treasury bill is a very different matter to selling ten-year bonds. ”The sort of investor who buys this is totally different to the traders who buy five- and ten- year bonds,” he said, and cautioned against “reading anything into this as bringing Ireland closer to returning to the bond market”.
It’s a toe in the water and a step in the right direction, though, he added.
Owen Callan, senior dealer at Danske Markets, also gave a cautious welcome to today’s Treasury Bill sale. He says that while the sale has gone well for the NTMA symbolically, “if we are to expect a full return to the long-term debt markets later this year, political and economic stabilisation in the eurozone, and signs of recovery in the domestic economy, are required”.
The T-Bills sold today are due to reach maturity on 15 October 2012. Interest is not paid on the Bills during their lifetimes; the government must pay their full value when they reach maturity.
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3bn texts in a 3 month period in Ireland, 12 bn in a year..
a 2 cent text tax would have raised ?240 million, All of the ?26m needed to protect the carers respite grant & child benefit. If my sums are right.
(0.02 x 12,000,000,000
= 240,000,000
This would be a creative and some what optional tax that does not effect peoples ability to survive.
Correct but since the boys in the Dail have free phones paid by, as with everything else, the taxpayer, then we would be worse off and they would once again be untouched.
Why should mobile users pay for the carer’s allowance. A couple of percent tax increase for high earners would easily make up the millions the government took from them.
isn’t there already VAT on text messaging? so double taxation is your answer?
@Gamma, I’m just trying to think of less painful ways to help our country…
Do you have any better idea’s? We’d love to hear them.
Your response is what is wrong with us, all moan no solution.
You can call it what you want but it doesn’t take food out of peoples mouths.. and that’s the point.
tooooo much calculations, tooooo much percentages, all we care for is to bring down all this mobile nd landline broadband services nd make it moooore effective in using, it’s tooo expensive here in Ireland compare to other EU country
Does that include iMessages which are free?
Presumably this includes FREE SMS with Vodafone to Any Network for Life (I’m assuming 3, O2, Meteor, 48, Eircon etc. all do similar deals for RTG Customers?)?
Top of my head I sent 1152 in October. Think highest was 2,170 in November 2011. Averages out at Circa 1,300 ish during/across the year.
have your say