CBN, DMO cancel August 5 Treasury Bills auction days after N4.69 trillion OMO mop-up
By Aboki Forex —
The Central Bank of Nigeria, acting for the Debt Management Office, has cancelled the planned August 5 Treasury Bills auction. The move comes just two days after the CBN drained N4.69 trillion from the banking system through back-to-back Open Market Operations auctions.
In a notice to authorised dealers, banks, investors and market participants, the CBN confirmed the auction would no longer hold. The notice, obtained by Nairametrics on Thursday, said all other auction dates on the N5.8 trillion Q3 2026 NTB Issuance Calendar remain unchanged.
Cancellation after massive OMO haul
The CBN had issued an Invitation to Tender for N700 billion in Treasury Bills across 91-day, 182-day and 364-day tenors. Bids were to be submitted electronically through the CBN S4 Web Interface on August 5, with settlement on August 6, 2026.
The regulators gave no official reason for the cancellation. But Nairametrics learnt that the N4.69 trillion two-day OMO haul drained liquidity faster than authorities expected.
“The scale of liquidity the CBN pulled out of the system in the two sessions immediately preceding the cancellation appears central to the decision,” a market dealer and member of FMDA told Nairametrics on Thursday, on condition of anonymity.
The OMO auctions took place on August 3 and 4. On August 3, the CBN mopped up N2.52 trillion via a 141-day bill. On August 4, it absorbed a further N2.17 trillion across 112-day and 113-day bills.
Heavy NTB demand already visible
This back-to-back haul came barely a week after the CBN allotted about N1.25 trillion against a N700 billion offer at its July 29 NTB auction. Demand was driven by extraordinary interest in the 364-day bill.
The apex bank may have concluded that pulling an additional N700 billion out of the system on August 5 risked over-tightening liquidity. OMO absorption was already running well ahead of plan.
The CBN has not said whether the N700 billion offer will be rescheduled or folded into a later auction. The withdrawn session was one of six flagged as the largest auction sessions in the Q3 2026 NTB Issuance Programme. The others are July 8, July 29, August 12, August 26 and September 2, each expected to offer roughly N700 billion.
Q3 issuance plan and liquidity signal
The programme, unveiled in early July, set a total Q3 issuance target of N5.8 trillion. That implies net new borrowing of about N3.16 trillion after accounting for maturing bills, more than four times the Q2 net target.
The 364-day bill alone was projected to account for N4.0 trillion, about 69% of total planned Q3 issuance. That reflects sustained institutional appetite for one-year paper.
The CBN had already drained N7.18 trillion from the banking system through OMO auctions in July. The N4.69 trillion absorbed on August 3 and 4 pushed cumulative OMO sterilisation for the two-month stretch to well above N11.8 trillion.
Market participants who had positioned for the August 5 session will now await guidance on whether the offer is rescheduled or folded into the next auction date.
For the naira and Nigerian businesses, the cancellation signals that the CBN is sensitive to over-tightening liquidity. But with the 364-day bill carrying a N4.0 trillion target for the quarter, the central bank must still find a way to make up the withdrawn N700 billion, whether through an upsized allotment or a recalibration of the Q3 calendar.