BRASILIA, May 29 (Reuters) - Brazil's federal public debt increased 0.99% in April from the previous month amid rising risk premiums and a significant issuance of bonds tied to the benchmark interest rate, the Treasury said on Wednesday.
Total debt stock reached 6.704 trillion reais ($1.29 trillion), with the government expecting it to end 2024 between 7 trillion and 7.4 trillion reais.
The Treasury highlighted that global assets have been affected by the expectation that interest rates in the U.S. would stay high for longer amid persistent inflation.
Revised expectations about monetary policy in both the U.S. and Brazil have caused the local interest rate curve to rise and steepen, it added.
There also was a significant volume of bond issuances tied to the Selic interest rate in April, amounting to 96.3 billion reais, which accounted for 72% of the total issued by the Treasury in the period.
These Selic-linked bonds, which are typically in higher demand during times of risk aversion, rose to 43.1% of the total, near the 44% ceiling forecast by the Treasury in its annual financing plan.
Helano Borges Dias, the general coordinator of public debt payment control at the Treasury, noted that there have been more fixed-rate and inflation-linked bonds in recent auctions.
($1 = 5.2096 reais) (Reporting by Marcela Ayres; Editing by Gabriel Araujo and Paul Simao)
