Govt to prematurely redeem ~30k cr of papers

The government will be prematurely redeeming ~30,000 crore of three bonds maturing between January and April 22, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) said in a notification. The government would be using its surplus cash balances to buy these papers, the central bank said. It is not uncommon for the government to prematurely buy papers to lessen the bunched-up payment obligation at the time of maturity, but the operation is ad hoc in nature. In the period between January and April 22, ~1.55 lakh crore of debt is scheduled to mature, including the amount scheduled to be bought back. The repurchase will happen in the secondary market on Wednesday between 2 pm and 3 pm.