Officials of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and the finance ministry would meet on September 29 to decide on the borrowing calendar for the second half of the current financial year, a senior finance ministry official said today.
“We will draw out a calendar for borrowings in October-March, and we are sticking to our borrowing target of Rs 4.51 lakh crore for the year. We are not going to top it,” the official said.
Soon after the finance ministry official’s comments, the 10-year benchmark 6.90 per cent, 2019 gilt was off lows by 11 paise to Rs 97.66, as market drew comfort that government was unlikely to exceed its borrowing target.
The official said the government was likely to adjust only Rs 6,000-7,000 crore of the cancelled Rs 12,000-crore auction this month, while the remaining amount would be adjusted during October-March.
“Of late, there has been some hardening of yields in the gilts market. So we decided to go a little slow on the borrowing to give some comfort (to the market). That is why, we are raising only Rs 11,000 crore this week, though we had thought of raising Rs 12,000 crore earlier.”
Yields on government bonds have been rising over the past few weeks. The yield of the 2019 gilt has risen about 40-50 basis points in the past one-and-a-half months.
The government had rejected all bids at the Rs 12,000-crore gilt auction on August 7, and finance ministry officials had said the amount would be adjusted in the remaining two auctions during September 11-18 and September 18-25.