A single trading session shows where Ghana’s debt market liquidity really sits — and how thin the corporate side remains.
Trading on the Ghana Fixed Income Market (GFIM), the platform where government and corporate debt securities change hands after issue, hit GH¢2.64 billion on Friday, 23 October. Bonds created under the Domestic Debt Exchange Programme (DDEP) accounted for almost three-quarters of that figure.
Financial news outlet Norvan Reports put the session at 641 separate transactions spread across government bonds, Treasury bills, corporate debt and sell/buy-back deals.
Where the money went
DDEP bonds — the instruments investors received when government restructured its domestic debt — recorded GH¢1.97 billion through 82 outright trades, or 74.53 per cent of turnover.
Treasury bills brought in GH¢603.48 million from 544 trades, about 22.88 per cent. Sell/buy-back deals in government bonds added GH¢66.20 million, and corporate bonds managed just GH¢1.99 million. Old government bonds saw only GH¢74,000. Nothing at all traded in the new government bond, commercial paper, or green and sustainable bond segments.
One bond did a third of the work
The 8.95 per cent DDEP bond maturing in February 2031 was the busiest security of the day. It posted GH¢801.42 million from 30 outright trades, closing at a yield of 14.43 per cent and a price of GH¢82.79 per GH¢100 of face value. Another GH¢61.33 million moved through five sell/buy-back deals, taking its combined total to GH¢862.74 million — close to a third of the whole market.
The February 2032 bond, carrying a 9.10 per cent coupon, followed with GH¢575.68 million across 21 trades. Its yield eased three basis points to 14.50 per cent, pushing the price to GH¢80.40 — still well below par, which reflects the low coupons inherited from the restructuring.
Not everything moved the same way. The shorter 8.35 per cent bond due February 2027 traded GH¢316.95 million, but its yield rose 29 basis points to 11.06 per cent. The 2038 bond, by contrast, closed 18 basis points lower at 14.57 per cent.
Bills are many, bonds are big
Treasury bills made up nearly 85 per cent of all trades but under a quarter of the value. The average DDEP bond trade was GH¢23.97 million; the average bill trade was GH¢1.11 million. That gap says institutional desks, not small investors, drive the headline numbers — and a few large orders can swing a day's total.
Among bills, the 9 August 2027 maturity led with GH¢115.90 million at a closing yield of 8.8085 per cent. Shorter paper, such as the January 2027 bill, closed at 4.5552 per cent, showing a clear premium for holding longer.
The gap that remains
Corporate debt was barely visible. A 13 per cent COCOBOD bond due August 2028 led with GH¢1.05 million. All corporate securities together came to less than one-tenth of one per cent of turnover.
For Ghanaians tracking the economy from abroad, the takeaway is simple: the restructured bonds can attract real demand, but liquidity is concentrated in a handful of maturities and private issuers still struggle to get a look in.
