- DDEP Trading Surges 148.89% as GFIM Weekly Turnover Jumps to GH¢9.01bn
Trading activity on the Ghana Fixed Income Market rebounded strongly in the week ended August 7, 2026, as investors shifted heavily into bonds issued under the Domestic Debt Exchange Programme, pushing total secondary-market turnover above GH¢9 billion.
The GFIM Weekly Wrap for August 3–7 shows that total securities traded reached GH¢9.01 billion, representing a 32.60% increase from GH¢6.80 billion in the preceding week.
The increase was almost entirely driven by renewed activity in DDEP bonds, where turnover surged 148.89% to GH¢5.67 billion from GH¢2.28 billion a week earlier.
DDEP securities consequently accounted for approximately 62.92% of all fixed-income trading during the week, firmly displacing Treasury bills as the dominant segment of secondary-market activity.
The shift is significant because it points to increased investor appetite for longer-duration government securities at a time when Ghana’s interest-rate environment is continuing to adjust to lower inflation and changing expectations around monetary policy.
Treasury bills, which had dominated the previous week, moved in the opposite direction.
Trading in short-dated government securities declined 25.81% to GH¢3.16 billion, from GH¢4.26 billion in the preceding week.
The contrasting movements suggest that some investors may be extending duration and repositioning portfolios towards longer-dated securities rather than concentrating liquidity exclusively at the short end of the government yield curve.
That rotation becomes even clearer when the composition of DDEP trades is examined.
The 9-year DDEP bond was the most actively traded security category during the week, attracting approximately GH¢1.98 billion in transactions, up sharply from GH¢827.36 million the previous week.
That represents an increase of roughly 139.39% in a single week.
The 9-year instrument alone accounted for approximately 34.93% of all DDEP bond turnover, making it the clearest centre of investor activity. The 11-year DDEP bond followed with GH¢1.24 billion in trades, compared with only GH¢30.00 million in the previous week.
That represents an extraordinary increase in liquidity and suggests that large institutional transactions played a significant role in the week’s market activity.
The 8-year DDEP bond attracted another GH¢903.60 million, more than double the GH¢405.55 million traded during the previous week.
Together, the 8-year, 9-year and 11-year DDEP securities accounted for approximately GH¢4.12 billion, or nearly 72.67% of total DDEP turnover.
Although headline DDEP trading reached GH¢5.67 billion, the underlying activity was not evenly spread across the restructured bond curve. Instead, investors concentrated heavily around selected medium-to-long maturities where liquidity was deepest and yields remained relatively attractive.
The 7-year DDEP bond also recorded substantial activity at GH¢582.49 million, although that was down from GH¢832.85 million in the preceding week.
Meanwhile, turnover in the 4-year DDEP security jumped to GH¢542.66 million from just GH¢76.86 million, while the 6-year bond increased sharply to GH¢218.09 million from GH¢4.92 million.
The 5-year DDEP bond, which had recorded no trades in the previous week, returned to the market with GH¢170.11 million in turnover.
The 14-year DDEP bond recorded GH¢17.14 million, the 12-year security GH¢13.78 million and the 15-year bond just GH¢3.67 million.
No activity was recorded in the 13-year DDEP bond. The pattern reinforces a central feature of Ghana’s post-debt-exchange fixed-income market: while DDEP securities have become important secondary-market instruments, liquidity remains highly concentrated around selected maturities.
Yield movements were equally revealing. The market recorded a mixed yield curve, with some maturities repricing sharply higher while others experienced notable declines.
The 4-year yield rose to 11.47% from 10.43%, an increase of 104 basis points, representing the largest upward movement among the securities captured in the weekly wrap.
The 8-year yield also increased materially, rising 72 basis points to 14.78% from 14.06%.
The 5-year yield moved to 13.38% from 13.05%, a 33-basis-point increase, while the 6-year yield climbed 59 basis points to 13.96%.
At the longer end, however, a different pattern emerged. The 12-year yield declined 58 basis points to 15.32% from 15.90%, while the 7-year DDEP yield fell by the same 58 basis points to 14.51% from 15.09%.
The 11-year yield declined 40 basis points to 15.39%, from 15.79%, while the 10-year yield fell 34 basis points to 14.66%.
The 15-year security also declined to 15.44% from 15.75%, a 31-basis-point drop.
The 13-year yield was unchanged at 15.77%, while the 14-year yield edged higher by 16 basis points to 15.57%.
The mixed movements suggest investors were differentiating sharply between individual maturities rather than treating the DDEP curve as a single trade.
Where yields declined, prices would generally have moved higher, signalling stronger demand for those securities. Where yields increased, the opposite pricing dynamic would typically apply.
That creates an increasingly important question for fixed-income investors: where on Ghana’s government yield curve is the best balance between duration risk and return?
Short-term Treasury bill rates have fallen considerably from the elevated levels seen during Ghana’s period of high inflation and monetary tightening.
Longer-dated DDEP securities, by comparison, continue to offer yields mostly in the mid-teens.
That spread can make longer-duration instruments increasingly attractive to investors who believe inflation and monetary-policy rates will remain contained.
But buying longer-duration bonds also carries greater sensitivity to future interest-rate movements and government credit perceptions.
The substantial trading recorded during the week therefore suggests not necessarily a wholesale abandonment of Treasury bills, but a more active search for yield further along the curve.
Treasury bills remained a major market segment, generating GH¢3.16 billion in turnover and accounting for roughly 35.05% of overall weekly trading.
But their decline from GH¢4.26 billion in the preceding week meant they lost the dominant position they previously held.
Other fixed-income segments remained marginal.
Sell/buy-back transactions declined 17.69% to GH¢177.29 million, from GH¢215.40 million.
Corporate securities recorded just GH¢4.22 million, representing a steep 90.54% decline from GH¢44.56 million the previous week.
That weakness highlights the continuing imbalance within Ghana’s fixed-income market.
Despite efforts to deepen corporate debt markets, government securities still account for virtually all secondary trading.
The limited turnover in corporate bonds means businesses seeking long-term capital through debt markets operate in a substantially thinner market than the government.
New Government of Ghana bonds also recorded only GH¢1.15 million in transactions during the week, while old government securities attracted a negligible GH¢92,269.
The numbers therefore leave the market overwhelmingly concentrated around two areas: DDEP bonds and Treasury bills.
That structure reflects the legacy of Ghana’s domestic debt restructuring.
The DDEP fundamentally changed the composition of government securities held by banks, pension funds, insurance companies, asset managers and other institutional investors.
As those securities increasingly change hands in the secondary market, their liquidity and yield movements are becoming important indicators of investor confidence in Ghana’s sovereign debt trajectory.
A more active DDEP market can be positive for market functioning. Investors are more willing to hold longer-dated securities when they know those instruments can be sold before maturity without excessive pricing discounts.
Liquidity also improves price discovery, helping the market establish a clearer yield curve for government borrowing.
But the week’s data show that liquidity remains uneven. More than seven out of every GH¢10 traded in DDEP bonds was concentrated in just three maturities.
That means a headline surge in turnover does not necessarily translate into uniformly deep liquidity across the full spectrum of restructured debt.
Still, the 148.89% increase in DDEP trading represents a substantial week-on-week change and suggests institutional portfolio activity is becoming increasingly important in shaping secondary-market flows.
With Ghana’s inflation rate remaining in single digits and monetary conditions considerably less restrictive than during the height of the economic crisis, investors are having to reassess the relative attractiveness of cash, Treasury bills and longer-duration bonds.
Falling short-term rates can encourage investors to lock in higher yields further down the curve before those rates potentially decline as well.
That dynamic could partly explain why several longer-dated DDEP securities attracted unusually large flows.
Yet the mixed yield movements caution against interpreting the week purely as a broad rally.
The sharp rise in the 4-year yield to 11.47% and the increase in the 8-year yield to 14.78% show that parts of the curve faced repricing pressure even as other maturities strengthened.
For portfolio managers, the market is therefore becoming more selective.
The question is no longer simply whether to hold government securities. It is increasingly about which maturity, at what yield and for how long.
That is likely to become one of the defining characteristics of Ghana’s fixed-income market as the country moves further away from the exceptional interest-rate environment that followed the domestic debt crisis.
The week ended August 7 provides an early indication of that transition. Total turnover rose by nearly one-third. DDEP transactions more than doubled. Treasury bill activity declined.
And trading became concentrated in selected medium- and long-dated bonds where investors appear willing to take greater duration exposure in exchange for yields approaching or exceeding 15.00%.
For now, the standout number remains GH¢5.67 billion.
That is how much DDEP debt changed hands in a single week almost two and a half times the previous week’s level and nearly two-thirds of the entire fixed-income market. The deeper signal, however, may be what lies behind that number.
Ghana’s secondary debt market is gradually moving from a period dominated by short-term liquidity management towards one in which investors are again making active decisions about duration, yield and long-term sovereign exposure.
If that trend continues, DDEP bonds may increasingly become the arena where the market expresses its view on Ghana’s fiscal recovery, interest-rate outlook and long-term credit risk.
