1. Money Market (MM)
MM is where organizations go to adjust their liquidity.
Market is a collection of dealers that specialize in one or more MM instruments.
Liquidity is stored in the MM by investing in MM securities (lending). Liquidity is purchased in the MM by selling MM securities (borrowing).
Ideal place for temporary investments.

2. Typical MM Instruments
typical maturities
U.S. Treasury Bills and 26 weeks
Repurchase agreements to 14 days
Commercial paper to 180 days
Negotiable CDs to 180 days
Fed Funds to 7 days
Banker’s acceptances to 180 days

3. Properties of a Good MM Instrument
low default risk.
short maturity (to have low price risk).
high marketability (typically facilitated by standardized features).
Sold in large denominations ($1 million is a tiny trade), per-dollar transaction costs thus kept low.

4. Auctioning New US T-Bills
Weekly auction by U.S. Treasury of 13-week, and 26-week bills. Other bills (e.g., 4-week, 52-week) sold on an as announced basis.
Sold at a discount basis.
Sold in multiples of $100.
$100 million is not a large institutional purchase.
All winning bidders pay same price which is the price of the lowest successful bid. Thursday/Monday/Thursday schedule.

5. For Instance, This Past Week’s Schedule
Thursday (Oct 25), Treasury Department announced sale of $39 billion of 26-week T-bills, that were auctioned off on Monday (Oct 29).
On auction dates, noncompetitive tenders due by 11:00 am, competitive tenders due by 11:30 am.
Results of auction announced minutes later.
Bills issued and payments made on Thursday (Nov 1).

6. https://www. treasurydirect

7. CUSIP Number Committee on Uniform Security Identification Procedures
A 9-digit alphanumeric identifier, such as
00817Y 10 8
Uniquely identifies each U.S. and Canadian security. CUSIP system, operated by Standard & Poor’s, but owned by American Bankers Association, is designed to facilitate bookkeeping and the settlement of trades.
First 6-characters identify “issuer”
Next two identify the “issue”
Last is a “check digit”

9. https://www. treasurydirect
Bid-to-Cover Ratio = 117.4/39.0 = 3.01

10. Competitive Bids Competitive bidders (dealers and large banks) specify
quantity
bank discount rate willing to accept (in multiples of .005%)
Treasury Dept. ranks bids according to bank discount rate (smallest to largest), then allocates down the list.
Bid-to-Cover Ratio signals how easy it is for US Gov’t to borrow money.
No more than 35% of an issue can be sold to any competitive bidder to ensure a competitive secondary market.

11. Noncompetitive Bids
small part of offering (usually not more than a few percent). All noncompetitive bids accepted.
Noncompetitive bidders (retail individuals like us and small banks) specify only quantity.
$5 million max per noncompetitive bidder.
receive the “High Rate” of accepted competitive bid tenders.
Can buy online. Set up account at (with bank routing number & bank account number). Treasury electronically debits your bank account at beginning & credits it at end.
Interest on US Treasuries taxed as ordinary income at the federal level, but not taxed at the state level.

12. FIMA (Noncompetitive Bids)
for Foreign and International Monetary Authority (FIMA) account participation.
that is, for foreign central banks and other international entities such as the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF).
FIMA entities have somewhat larger maximums per noncompetitive bidder, but rest of rules the same.

13. Example 1: Overview offering competitive ($49.5 B total)
Tenders with lowest
discount rate bids
accepted
$15.9 B
accepted
$18 B
noncompetitive
$2.1 B
$33.6 B
rejected

14. Example 1: Auction Process
Competitive tenders
$2.5 billion %
$5.0 billion
$6.0 billion
$2.0 billion
$4.5 billion
$9.0 billion
$11.0 billion
$9.5 billion
Offering Amount
$18.0 billion
Noncompetitive tenders
$2.1 billion
Competitive tenders
$49.5 billion
High Rate (highest accepted rate)
3.945%
Bid-to-Cover Ratio
( )/18 = 2.87
Competitive tenders Allocated at High rate
.4/4.5 = 8.89%
Median Rate (of accepted competitive tenders)
3.910%
Low Rate
3.880%

15. Secondary Market for T-Bills
bank discount rates
investment rate
Bid & Asked are bank discount rates. Bid applies when customer sells, Asked applies when customer buys.
Asked Yield is bond equivalent rate.

16. Discount Rate The (bank) discount rate yd is given by:
Solving for P0 we have
where Pf is face value
P0 is discounted price (today’s price)
n is calendar days to maturity

17. Example 2: Using Bank Discount Rate
Consider a $1,000 T-bill that matures in 133 days whose Bid and Asked quotes are 4.96 and 4.92, respectively. If selling, would get
If buying, would cost

18. Bond Equivalent Rate Bond equivalent rate ybe is given by
Solving for P0 we have
Bond equivalent yields are reported to facilitate comparison against other debt instruments.
(note 365 annualizer and discounted price is in denominator)

19. Example 3: Using Bond Equivalent Rate
Bond Equivalent Rate is same as Investment Rate as on slides 8 & 15.
Suppose you are contemplating a $1,000 T-bill that matures in 67 days whose Asked Yield is How much would it cost?

20. Fed Funds Unsecured loans between banks.
Overnight interest rate called the fed funds rate.
Term “fed funds” is misleading.
Typically done in units of $1 million.
Yields on fed funds assume 360-day year. Conversion to bond equivalent yield is as follows.

21. Commercial Paper Review slides 9-12 in Module 2.3.
Compete head-to-head against T-bills. Consequently, sold at discount, and quoted using bank discount rate
There is a secondary market.
Virtually impossible to sell without backup line of credit and a P-1 or A-1 rating.

22. Federal Agencies
Established by Congress for public policy reasons to assure availability of capital in areas of the economy where credit might otherwise be insufficient or too costly.
Farm credit
Home mortgages
Others
Agencies obtain the money they lend out by issuing agency securities (bonds).
Such agency debt qualifies as legal instruments to be held by banks, insurance companies, and pension funds.

23. Government Sponsored Enterprises
Agency (GSE) debt perceived to have only slightly greater default risk than US Treasuries.
Marketability very good.
(Fannie Mae) Federal National Mortgage Association (1938, stockholder owned since 1968)
(Freddie Mac) Federal Home Loan Mortgage Association (stockholder owned, created in 1970 to provide competition for Fannie Mae)
First five in Exhibit 7.5 on p. 214 are some other GSEs.

24. Federally Owned Agencies
(Ginnie Mae) Government National Mortgage Association (established 1968)
Insures mortgage bonds backed by pools of VA and FHA (Federal Housing Authority) insured mortgages.
Tennessee Valley Authority another federally owned corporation (see last five entries in Exhibit 7.5 for some others)
Ginnie Mae debt and debt issued by other federally owned corporations considered just as safe as US Treasuries.

25. Retail Certificates of Deposit
Issued by banks to finance their business activities.
Not negotiable – no secondary market, can only be sold back to issuing bank early, with penalty.
Issued at face value with interest as an “add on”.
Interest based on a 365 day year.
Can be in any denomination.
FDIC insured up to standard amounts.
Banks typically use standard maturities such as 0.5, 1.0, 1.5, 2.0 and 5.0 years.

26. Negotiable Certificates of Deposit
Large-denomination CDs issued by well-known banks are negotiable (exists a secondary market for them).
Issued at face value with interest as an “add on”.
Stated interest computed on a 360-day year (like Fed Funds).
Interest rates on negotiable CDs are higher than on T-Bills because of higher credit risk and lower marketability.
Purchased mainly by corporate businesses.