US Treasury Issues More Government Debt to Manage Budget Deficit

The U.S. Treasury plans to hold massive debt auctions to help plug the gaping hole in the budget deficit. In the coming three months, officials announced on Jan. 31 that they would bolster the size of auctions to refund more than $105 billion of privately held Treasury notes maturing on Feb. 15. It is estimated that the issuance will generate nearly $16 billion in new cash from private investors. Josh Frost, the assistant secretary for financial markets, confirmed that the 2- and 5-year bonds will increase by $9 billion to a record $70 billion. For the benchmark 10-year Treasury, officials plan to boost the new issue and reopening auction size by $2 billion to $39 billion. The 20-year bond will stay the course, while the new issue size for the 30-year bond will jump by $1 billion to $22 billion....