OREANDA-NEWS. Today the Bank of Lithuania started holding reverse auctions of public sector purchase programme via Bloomberg auctions platform.

‘For eight months we had held auctions with domestic market counterparties using our internal system. After migrating to Bloomberg, the reverse auctions of public sector purchase programme will be available to a wider circle of counterparties and we will be able to organise them more smoothly,’ said Algirdas Neciunskas, Head of the Eurosystem Operations Division at the Bank of Lithuania.  

The Bank of Lithuania has been holding auctions to purchase Lithuanian Government Securities issued in the domestic market on a regular basis since early this year, after the trial reverse auctions, held from October to December 2015. The reverse auctions are part of the expanded asset purchase programme, which the Eurosystem is implementing with the aim to achieve inflation rates below, but close to, 2% over the medium term.

The expanded asset purchase programme consists of the third covered bond purchase programme, asset-backed securities purchase programme, public sector purchase programme, and — as of June this year — the corporate sector purchase programme. The Eurosystem’s total purchases under this programme amount to EUR 80 billion per month.

The total amount of Lithuanian Government Securities offered to the Bank of Lithuania in today’s reverse auction reached EUR 16 million, while the allocated amount was EUR 4,2 million. The results of reverse auctions are published at http://www.lb.lt/asset_purchase_programs.

Currently, at the reverse auctions of the public sector purchase programme, the Bank of Lithuania only purchases Lithuanian Government Securities that are registered in the Republic of Lithuania. The auctions are usually held on Tuesdays and Thursdays and are open to both domestic and foreign counterparties.