The rate of buying under CBBP3 increased last week, with figures showing that the portfolio grew by Eu2.188bn in the week to Friday, but analysts noted the pace of secondary market purchases remains below the programme’s long term average.

Figures released by the European Central Bank yesterday (Monday) showed that settled and outstanding purchases under its third covered bond purchase programme rose Eu2.188bn to Eu98.246bn. In the previous reporting period, the CBPP3 portfolio grew by just Eu1.491bn, one of the programme’s smallest weekly increases.

Analysts said Monday’s figure meant the pace of buying had risen back into line with the recent average. With no public CBPP3-eligible deals having settled in the last two weeks, the figures reflected only secondary buying, they noted, the pace of which increased from Eu298m in the previous reporting period to Eu438m last week.

“We are still talking about one of the lower numbers of the programme,” said Florian Eichert, head of covered bond and SSA research at Crédit Agricole, “but secondary purchases are back in the range that we had been in before last week’s drop.”

Jussi Harju, covered bond analyst at Barclays, calculated that since the start of the programme the Eurosystem has bought on average Eu474m of covered bonds per day day on the secondary market, when adjusting for holidays.

“The pace of secondary purchases has fluctuated quite a bit since the end of May but it is clearly trending down and is currently below the long term average since CBPP3 started,” he said.

Settled and outstanding purchases under the public sector purchase programme (PSPP) meanwhile increased Eu11.68bn to Eu216.346bn last week, up from a Eu10.766bn increase in the previous reporting period.