The National Treasury Management Agency, which borrows money on behalf of the State, has recently sold € 600 million of Treasury Bills. The yields or the cost of borrowing the money has decreased with an auction two weeks ago when more debt was offered.

 

Treasury Bills or T Bills are a way of securing short term funding and they must be repaid in within months rather then over a period of years. The National Treasury Management Agency sold the following T Bills

 

Ø      € 400 million of T Bills maturing in April 2011

Ø      € 200 million of T Bills maturing in February 2011

 

The offer was over subscribed six times indicating strong demand and the interest rates that Ireland had to pay for the short term debt were lower then they were two weeks ago. The average interest rate on the six month bill was 1.978% while it was 2.348% on the eight month bills.

 

The sale comes a day after a rating agency downgrade of Ireland which worried international markets. The yield on Irish 10 year bonds went above 5.4% second only to Greece in the Euro Zone.