The year of fever for Treasury bills has closed with the acquisition, by individuals, of 21.3 billion euros in this type of debt. It is by far the highest volume so far this century and contrasts with the approximate average of 15 million euros per year registered between 2017 and 2021.
Interest in Treasury bills began at the end of last year, when sharp increases in interest rates encouraged many individuals to invest the savings accumulated during the pandemic in fixed income, and it has not just declined. The resistance of banks to remunerate deposits largely explains this phenomenon, in which investors look for the safest formula to obtain returns greater than 3%.
The last auction of the year, for three- and nine-month bills, closed this Tuesday with interests of 3.6% and 3.5%, respectively. They are below the maximum of 3.8% reached this year, although in line with the trend since the European Central Bank (ECB) placed interest rates at 4.5%.
Treasury bills, says Sofía Antón, director of Auriga Bonos, have become this year “the preferred choice for individual investors looking for short-term profitability.” The cause is, as she says, in the “absence of competing investment products”, in view of the “little or no remuneration” of deposits.
Individuals accounted for nearly half of the demand in several bill issues at the beginning of the year and their interest continues, although in a more moderate way. After the summer, banks have begun to remunerate deposits at an average rate of 2.45%, which has allowed them to capture nearly 28,000 million and increase their liabilities to 111,499 million.
Of the Treasury bills in circulation, 30% are now owned by individuals, when just a year ago the percentage barely reached 2.4%. They constitute the main group of investors, above foreigners, who have 26%, or banks, which have around 10.7 billion invested, 15% of the total.
The question now is whether individuals will maintain their appetite for this product, which at the beginning of last year caused queues of retirees at the Bank of Spain. “I understand that the trend is going to continue, since I do not see banks paying interest on deposits from medium and small-sized individuals, and even less so taking into account that financial entities do not have a liquidity shortage problem, nor will they. have,” says Antonio Castelo, iBroker analyst.
Antón agrees with this forecast: “We project that this reign will last over time” because it is “unlikely that central banks will reduce interest rates until the end of 2024.” The renewals of the bills' maturities next year and “the tendency of banks to not remunerate clients' liquidity at competitive rates” encourage him to think that the interest in the purchase of this type of debt will remain.
The Ministry of Economy explained this Tuesday that the Treasury has issued a total debt this year for 65,000 million euros in net terms, 5,000 million less than initially planned. If refinancings are added, gross issues have amounted to 252 billion euros.
After the rate increases, the average cost of outstanding debt, whose average life is 8 years, stood at 2.09%, 0.36 points more than a year ago. Foreign investors have bought 40% of the debt, whose risk premium has remained around 100 basis points.
