Bond Index Inclusion Boost Expected

Bonds are expected to gain in India amid broad risk off trade in the Asia-Pac region, while there could be an extra boost after a government official said inclusion of India's bonds in global indexes could be complete as soon as March. At a conference Sanjeev Sanyal, principal adviser to the finance ministry, said: "Ninety-nine percent of the stuff that needs to be done has been done", adding "So rest assured that in this financial year at least some announcement should happen on that space so that we can get into these indexes. They are a good, stable source of money." Bonds declined on Friday after the weekly auction, the sale was fully subscribed and saw the RBI sell INR 260bn of securities. Markets look ahead to the RBI's conversion operation today, the RBI will switch INR 100bn of shorter dated securities for those with longer maturities.