By Ademola Alawiye

The Central Bank of Nigeria said it sold N130bn ($840m) worth of treasury bills as part of measures to control money supply in the economy.

The apex bank said on Friday that it had sold N50bn each in the 182-day and 364-day instruments at marginal rates of 8.41 per cent and 9.09 per cent respectively.

It added that it sold N30bn in the 91-day bills at 6.8 per cent.

The yield on the 182-day paper was higher than at the previous auction last month, when it was offered at 8.25 per cent.

The yields on the 364-day and 91-day instruments were down slightly from 9.10 per cent and 6.85 per cent previously.

Total subscription stood at N310.79bn compared with N364.6bn last month.

Reuters quoted dealers as saying that N70bn worth of papers matured last week, which means only N60bn actually left the system for the CBN’s vaults.

Africa’s top energy producer issues treasury bills regularly as part of measures to curb inflation, control money supply and help lenders manage their liquidity.

The CBN intends to get headline inflation, which stood at 12.1 per cent, year-on-year, in January to a single digit figure.

Source: Punch