16.12.2013

The Ministry of Finance reopened for the 6th time during the year the 10.5 year benchmark issue of BGN denominated Government Securities (GS) issued on 9 January 2013 with maturity 9 June 2023. The issue is a reference one in respect of the harmonised long term interest rate to evaluate convergence level, part of the Maastricht criteria. At the auction held on 16 December 2013 the yield achieved was 3.56% for the GS offered to the amount BGN 50 million and the coverage coefficient was 1.61. The yield reported is still below the published by the ECB in November long term interest rate value for Bulgaria - 3.64%. The second lowest for the year spread to the German Bunds in this maturity segment of 1.83% has been achieved.

The biggest amount of GS acquired pension funds - 59.50%, followed by banks - 30.50% and investment intermediaries - 10.0%. After the 6th reopening the issue totals BGN 350 million.

The yield achieved on the Bulgarian long term bod is below that of bonds with similar characteristics of EU Member State and countries from the region: Turkey (9.350%), Hungary (5.928%), Romania (5.449%), Spain (4.019%), Latvia (3.917%), Italy (3.853%) and Lithuania (3.86%).