Greece to reopen 3-, 5-yr bond issues in coming weeks

Greece plans to reopen its recent three- and five-year bond issues in the next two weeks to top them up by up to 1.5 billion euros ($1.97 billion), accepting T-bills as payment instead of cash, a senior government source told Reuters on Monday.

“There is a plan to reopen these issues in the next couple of weeks. Payment will be in outstanding T-bills instead of cash,” the government official said on condition of anonymity.

Athens wants to increase liquidity in this part of its yield curve, which can help to tighten bid-offer spreads, the official added.

Greece has a stock of about 15 billion euros of outstanding T-bills and refinances them on a monthly basis.

The country broke a four-year exile from bond markets earlier this year with a five-year bond issue in April and a subsequent three-year issue in July, raising a combined 4.5 billion euros from foreign investors.