TheCable

The Debt Management Office (DMO) on Monday raised the interest band for the federal government savings bonds to 14.535 percent from 13.79 percent in April — for the three year tenor.

This means that while you would have gotten N13,790 in a year as interest if you invested in April, you can now get as much as N14,535 going by the new interest rate.

As for the two-year tenor of the FGN savings bond, the coupon payment is put at 13.535 percent. In others words, for every N100,000 invested, the investor gets over N13,535 for the first year, and the same amount for the second year, before the recovery of initial capital.

The coupon payment is made in four tranches — one tranche per quarter — to make the entire interest advertised.

DMO had introduced the retail bond in March 2017 and has since opened an investment window for interested parties every month, with the August offer running from August 7-11.

In April, DMO had offered 12.79 percent interest on the two-year bond and 13.79 percent on the three-year bond.

In May, DMO increased the interest rate to 13.18 and 14.18 percent on the two and three-year bonds respectively.

It maintained the rates in June but increased it to 13.38 and 14.38 percent in July.

The rates for August, which was released on Sunday are 13.53 and 14.53 percent.

According to the DMO, the bond is fully backed by the full faith and credit of the federal government of Nigeria, with quarterly coupon payments to bond holders.

The Buhari-led administration has issued various bonds and treasury bills to help fund the nation’s budget deficit.

In February, the federal government issued a $1bn Eurobond and the first sovereign green bond, which is worth N20 billion has also been announced although it has not been issued.

The Eurobond, which was issued at 7.875 percent, was oversubscribed by almost eight times and has already been listed on the London Stock Exchange and the Nigerian Stock Exchange.

Increasing interest rates may have been introduced by the DMO to attract more subscribers.