ATHENS: Greece saw "huge demand" on Thursday in another tentative return to markets with a seven-year-bond, its first sale of the sort since the start of the economic crisis, Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras said.
"We had good news from the markets. The transaction is going well," Tsipras told visiting EU Economic Affairs Commissioner Pierre Moscovici about the issue, which sought to raise around 3.0 billion euros ($3.7 billion).
Ahead of an official announcement, state agency ANA said the sale drew offers of around 6.5 billion euros at an interest rate of 3.5 percent.
The last seven-year bond, sold at an interest rate of six percent, was issued in April 2010 -- days before the country publicly requested the first of its three EU-IMF bailouts.
Greece currently has no urgent need to draw money from the bond markets as it is still receiving financial support at lower rates under its international bailout that ends in August.
However it is a psychological milestone, demonstrating that Greece is back on the road to weaning itself off bailout aid, as well as build a precautionary cash cushion of around 20 billion euros.
In July, Greece made its first return to debt markets after a three-year hiatus, selling three billion euros' worth of five-year bonds at 4.625 percent, lower than its previous outing in 2014.
In November, it passed another test by swapping around 25.5 out of 29.6 billion euros in debt issued in 2012.
Athens had originally geared Thursday's sale for Tuesday but it was postponed amid global stock market turmoil earlier this week.
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