(Business in Cameroon) - The public stock market of the Bank of Central African States (BEAC), issuing institution of the six CEMAC countries, was particularly enlivened on 16 November 2016. Indeed, three States proceeded on the same day with issuances of fungible Treasury bonds (BTA in French) with a maturity of 26 and 52 weeks.

Cameroon, Gabon and the Central African Republic (CAR) were thus planning to raise a global amount of FCfa 22.5 billion, to reduce their treasury deficits.

With its 52-week BTA and 12 primary bond specialists, Gabon was seeking FCfa 10 billion; against FCfa 7 billion for Cameroon and its 16 primary dealers; and FCfa 5.5 for CAR, who had only three primary dealers for the operation.

Since last year, the BEAC stock market has been in increasingly high demand by the States, due to the drop in crude oil prices. This international situation led to the drastic cuts in public revenues in a fair number of countries in the CEMAC, such as Gabon, Congo, Chad and Equatorial Guinea.

Based on the statistics revealed on 14 April 2016 by the BEAC’s Monitoring Committee of the Cellule de Regulation et Conservation de Titres (CRCT – account manager, settlement agent and central depository), the issuance of public securities doubled in 2015 compared to 2014.

These operations carried out by the public Treasuries of the CEMAC member States on the central bank’s market, we learned, peaked at FCfa 635.8 billion as at end February 2016, against FCfa 312.4 billion over the same period in 2015.

BRM