The sale of T-bills worth MVR 2.9 billion to cover government expenditure has been announced.
Treasury bills are sold to be paid back with interest in order to raise funds for the government. The sale of T-bills through the Maldives Monetary Authority (MMA) is opened once a week to manage the government's cash flow.
T-bills are usually sold to the Pension Fund, banks, state-owned enterprises and private companies.
According to the announcement made yesterday by the Finance Ministry, four T-bills worth a total of MVR 2.9 billion are to be sold next Sunday.
Of the funds needed to finance a supplementary budget passed for this year, MVR 3 billion will be raised from the domestic market, Finance Minister Dr. Mohamed Shafeeq said. The rest of the budget is to be managed through economizing and deferring expenditure.
Details of T-bills to be sold on Sunday:
- MVR 1.1 billion T-bill: 3.5% interest and 28-day repayment period
- MVR 263.4 million T-bill: 3.8% interest and 98-day repayment period
- MVR 79 million T-bill: 4.23% interest and 182-day repayment period
- MVR 995.5 million T-bill: 4.6% interest and 364-day repayment period
The number of T-bills that can be sold in a year to raise funds to manage government cash flow is approved with the budget. On most occasions, proceeds from the sale of T-bills are used to make payments for previously sold T-bills.
Finance Ministry statistics show that the total outstanding stock of securities sold by the government as of November 7 exceeds MVR 76.7 billion, including MVR 39.6 billion worth of T-bills that have not reached maturity.
