Slovakia rejects all bids in 19-yr bond auction

...Agency said.

The debt agency, which handles sales of state securities for the ministry, said total demand was 1.172 billion crowns ($52.16 million) in the ninth sale of the bond that matures on May 10, 2026. The agency did not comment on the result of the auction.

The minimum yield demanded by investors was 4.70 percent, the average demanded yield stood at 4.846 percent and the maximum requested yield was 4.949 percent.

ARDAL has rejected all bids in the previous four bond auctions due to the favourable development of the state budget. It has refused to sell any state paper in nine auctions out of 21 so far this year.

The last successful auction of 19-year paper was in February, when the debt agency sold 915 million crowns worth of bonds at an average yield of 4.452 percent.

ARDAL said in June it had almost satisfied its borrowing needs for 2007 and would probably not issue many more bonds this year. One more bond auction is scheduled for December 10.

Slovakia's central state budget showed a surplus of 6.9 billion crowns ($307.1 million) for January-October, compared with a 1.1 billion crown gap in the first ten months of 2006.

(Reporting by Martin Santa; editing by Alan Crosby)

($1=22.47 Slovak Crown)

Keywords: SLOVAKIA BOND/

[BRATISLAVA/Reuters/Finance.cz]