- Treasury Bills Dominate GFIM Trading as Daily Volume Drops To GH¢2.08bn
The Ghana Fixed Income Market recorded GH¢2.08 billion in trading volume on Tuesday, November 10, down 30.6 per cent from GH¢3.00 billion a day earlier. Yet activity was not simply weaker: the number of transactions rose from 323 to 398, a 23.2 per cent increase.
That divergence points to a change in the composition and size of trading. Average volume per transaction fell from about GH¢9.28 million on Monday to GH¢5.23 million on Tuesday. The figures do not show how many individual investors were involved, but they do suggest that the market’s higher transaction count came alongside much smaller average trade sizes.
The largest change was the shift from domestic debt exchange programme (DDEP) bonds to Treasury bills. DDEP volume fell 63 per cent, from GH¢2.49 billion to GH¢920.49 million. Treasury bill volume moved in the opposite direction, rising 153 per cent to GH¢1.13 billion from GH¢447.36 million.
Treasury bills therefore became the largest segment by volume, making up about 54 per cent of Tuesday’s total. DDEP bonds accounted for approximately 44 per cent. On Monday, DDEP bonds had been the dominant instrument, representing about 83 per cent of market volume.
The reversal matters because aggregate turnover can conceal changes in investor preference and market activity.
A smaller daily total might appear to signal a broad retreat, but Tuesday’s data show a market with more recorded transactions and a substantially different mix of instruments. Short-term government paper supplied the largest share of volume, while trading in restructured government debt receded.
That should not be read as proof that investors have decisively shifted away from DDEP bonds. One day’s trading is a narrow snapshot, and the report does not identify the buyers or sellers behind the flows. But the scale of the daily move highlights how quickly the market’s headline volume can be shaped by a small number of large trades.
The concentration is visible in the report’s largest-trade entries. The biggest DDEP transaction on Tuesday involved GH¢769.32 million of a bond maturing in February 2029, with a reported yield of 14.27 per cent and closing price of 89.38. That single security accounted for about 84 per cent of all DDEP volume for the day.
Treasury bill trading was also concentrated. The largest reported bill trade was GH¢473.45 million in a security maturing on October 4, 2027, with a reported yield of 9.15 per cent and closing price of 92.38.
The report lists two transactions for that security. Its volume was equivalent to about 42 per cent of total Treasury bill trading on Tuesday.
These large trades help explain why turnover rose sharply in bills even as overall market volume declined. They also caution against treating the day’s totals as a broad-based measure of demand across every instrument. A few transactions can move the aggregate substantially, especially in a market where activity is uneven across securities.
The fall in DDEP trading was accompanied by a drop in the number of transactions, from 33 on Monday to 18 on Tuesday. This makes the decline more than a simple change in the average size of DDEP trades: fewer trades were recorded, and their combined volume was lower.
The report does not establish whether this reflects reduced investor appetite, the timing of portfolio adjustments or the absence of another unusually large transaction like Monday’s.
Other segments remained comparatively small. Corporate bond volume rose from GH¢1.32 million to GH¢1.66 million, although the number of trades slipped from nine to eight.
Commercial paper trading fell sharply, from GH¢10.98 million across two transactions to GH¢2.42 million across 16 transactions. The paper traded was Cocoa Capital PLC’s commercial paper maturing in June 2027, with a closing price of 100.48 and a reported rating of A/Beacon.
The contrast between commercial paper’s higher transaction count and lower volume also reinforces the day’s wider pattern: more transactions did not translate into more money changing hands.
Average commercial paper volume per transaction fell from about GH¢5.49 million to roughly GH¢151,000. Again, the daily report does not explain who traded or why, but the arithmetic shows that turnover was spread across smaller transactions.
Sell/buy-back trades in government notes and bonds fell by about 50.7 per cent, from GH¢50.05 million to GH¢24.69 million. The number of these trades increased from 23 to 30, another example of rising transaction counts alongside reduced volumes.
No new government notes or bonds, old government notes or bonds, or green and sustainable bonds recorded volume on Tuesday.
The most useful reading of the session is therefore not simply that the market contracted. It was a lower-volume day in which trading became more transaction-heavy, but less concentrated in large aggregate volume across the market as a whole.
Treasury bills took the lead, DDEP activity pulled back, and other instruments remained marginal.
For investors and market watchers, the next sessions will show whether Tuesday’s pattern marks a sustained preference for shorter-dated government securities or a temporary adjustment after Monday’s unusually heavy DDEP activity.
A run of sessions would be needed to distinguish a genuine shift in demand from day-to-day volatility.
The market’s challenge is to turn headline activity into depth: consistent trading across a wider range of securities, with volumes that are not excessively dependent on a few large transactions.
Tuesday’s 398 trades show that activity can be frequent even when aggregate volume falls. Whether that points to broader participation or simply smaller trades cannot be determined from the report alone. What is clear is that the market’s centre of gravity moved sharply towards Treasury bills, even as total volume retreated.
