- Fixed-Income Market Trading Opens Week at GH¢2.15bn on Heavy T-Bill Activity
Trading on the Ghana Fixed Income Market opened the week with GH¢2.15 billion in securities changing hands on Monday, August 17, 2026, as Treasury bills overwhelmingly dominated activity and longer-dated government bonds attracted comparatively limited investor participation.
A total of 877 transactions were recorded across Treasury bills, Domestic Debt Exchange Programme bonds, old government securities, corporate bonds and sell-buy-back transactions, according to the GFIM daily trading report.
Treasury bills accounted for GH¢1.96 billion, representing approximately 91.16% of total market volume and 865 of the 877 transactions recorded during the session.
The concentration highlights the continuing preference for short-term government instruments even as yields at the shorter end of the curve remain considerably below levels seen during earlier phases of Ghana’s domestic debt adjustment.
The single largest Treasury bill position traded was the security maturing on January 18, 2027, which recorded volume of GH¢746.90 million across 60 transactions. Its reported closing yield was about 6.75%, with a closing price of approximately GH¢97.22, making the instrument alone responsible for almost 35.00% of total fixed-income volume recorded across the entire market during Monday’s session.
Activity was also significant further along the Treasury bill maturity curve. The bill maturing on August 2, 2027 recorded GH¢568.04 million in volume at a closing yield of about 12.14%, while the August 9, 2027 maturity attracted GH¢127.61 million at approximately 12.30%.
The newest one-year security, maturing on August 16, 2027, recorded GH¢50.93 million in transactions at a closing yield of 12.45%, illustrating the increasingly steep yield progression as investors extend duration.
The yield structure is important because investors are accepting significantly lower returns on securities close to maturity while demanding progressively higher compensation for tying money up over longer periods. That shape reflects both the repricing of short-term government borrowing and the risk premium investors continue to attach to duration, particularly where future inflation, monetary policy and liquidity conditions remain uncertain.
Domestic Debt Exchange Programme bonds were the second-largest segment, recording GH¢185.28 million from just three transactions and contributing 8.63% of total market activity. The concentration within so few trades suggests that Monday’s DDEP turnover was driven primarily by large institutional transactions rather than broad-based secondary-market participation.
The most active DDEP instrument was the 9.10% bond maturing in February 2032, which accounted for GH¢147.89 million in a single transaction. The bond closed at a yield of 14.50% and a price of approximately GH¢80.00, indicating that investors continue to price several restructured government securities at substantial discounts to their face value even as secondary-market liquidity gradually develops.
A second DDEP bond maturing in February 2031 recorded GH¢17.39 million in volume at a closing yield of 14.60%, while the August 2028 DDEP instrument attracted GH¢20.00 million at 13.56%. The relatively higher yields on these securities compared with Treasury bills underline the premium demanded for longer maturity exposure and the residual risk considerations associated with securities issued under Ghana’s domestic debt restructuring.
Corporate bond activity remained modest, with GH¢3.56 million traded across five transactions, equivalent to just 0.17% of the day’s overall market volume. Ghana Cocoa Board securities dominated the corporate segment, led by the 13.00% bond maturing in August 2028, which recorded GH¢2.41 million in a single transaction at a closing price of about GH¢101.65.
Another COCOBOD security maturing in August 2027 recorded GH¢1.15 million across four transactions, while bonds issued by other corporate borrowers did not record meaningful volume during the session.
The contrast with government securities illustrates the continuing depth problem in Ghana’s corporate debt market, where relatively limited secondary-market liquidity can make price discovery and investor exits more difficult than in sovereign instruments.
Old Government of Ghana notes and bonds attracted just GH¢64,500 in trading, while no trades were recorded in the new seven-year government bond category. Sell-buy-back transactions across government securities contributed another GH¢887,984 from three transactions, representing only about 0.04% of overall fixed-income activity.
The largest sell-buy-back position involved the DDEP bond maturing in February 2038, with GH¢647,414 traded across two transactions at a yield of 13.38%. These transactions remain an important liquidity-management mechanism for market participants, but their relatively small contribution on Monday reinforces how completely outright Treasury bill trading dominated the session.
The August 17 results therefore point to a market in which liquidity remains abundant but heavily concentrated at the short end of the government curve. Treasury bills provide investors with relatively high liquidity, easier price discovery and considerably shorter exposure periods, advantages that remain compelling despite the substantial compression in short-term yields.
For Ghana’s fixed-income market, the longer-term challenge is whether liquidity can gradually spread beyond Treasury bills into DDEP securities, new government bonds and corporate debt.
Monday’s GH¢2.15 billion turnover demonstrates that considerable money continues to circulate through the market, but with more than GH¢9 out of every GH¢10 traded concentrated in Treasury bills, the structure remains overwhelmingly tilted towards short-duration government paper.
