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By Angelo S. Samonte, Reporter
SMALL Filipino savers wanting to
take a piece of the government’s planned retail Treasury bond (RTB)
sale could expect to earn interest rates approximating prevailing
market rates, according to the Bureau of Treasury.
“The returns would be better
for the investors today because of higher interest rate[s],”
Finance Undersecretary Roberto Tan, the acting national treasurer
said. “There is a possibility that we conduct the same auctions in
the future if this one would be successful.”
The treasury bureau will peg the
yields for the RTB at the rates for 3- and 5-year debt papers that
are nearing maturity. The prevailing market rates are 6.91 percent
and 7.21 percent for 3- and 5-year T-bonds, respectively.
“We are happy to get involve[d]
in the transaction,” Roberto Juanchito Dispo, First Metro
Investment Corp. executive vice president said. The company is one
of the managers and coordinators of the debt paper sale.
“RTBs are safe, high yielding,
affordable, and make investors’ cash flow more frequent,” he
said.
The government failed to market
the same instruments last year owing to low market rates, thus it
wants to seize the opportunity of higher rates today.
The government earlier announced
that it will sell 3- and 5-year RTBs worth P8 billion at an auction
set for July 23.
Tan said the auction for 5-year
regular T-bonds originally scheduled for July 24 has been cancelled
to give way to the RTB sale, which comes seven months after the last
such issue.
The treasury bureau’s offer
last December of RTBs, which are available to ordinary individual
investors, raised P8.3 billion for the government, well below its
target of P20 billion.
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