Cash-strapped Treasury Department sells one-day bills for the first time since 2007

• The Treasury Department auctioned $15 billion in one-day cash management bills on Friday.
• That marks the first time since 2007 that the government sold such short-term debt.

The Treasury Department auctioned $15 billion in one-day cash management bills on Friday as its cash balance remains under pressure.

The bills, which carry a 5.145% investment rate, will be issued Monday and mature on Tuesday, according to the Treasury. Bids totaling $61.6 billion were tendered.

This is the first time since 2007 that one-day bills were auctioned, according to CNN.

The auction comes as the Senate passed a debt limit deal late Thursday with President Biden expected to sign it on Friday. That will avert a default with just days to spare as the Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has said the government was set to run out of cash on Monday without a deal.

Leading up to the debt deal, the Treasury has been scrambling to find cash to pay the government's bills on time.

According to the latest update, its cash balance was $48.5 billion as of Wednesday, up from a six-year low of $37.4 billion a day earlier but down from $140 billion in mid-May.

One-day securities are highly irregular, with most cash management bills spanning a few days to a year. In 25 years, there have been only six one-day CMB auctions.

Once the debt ceiling is officially lifted, the Treasury will rush to replenish its cash coffers and already plans a $123 billion T-bill auction on Monday. It previously characterized the auction as dependent on whether a debt limit deal would be reached.

Analysts at Goldman Sachs estimated last month that the Treasury may issue $700 billion in T-bills within weeks of a debt deal.

Others have said debt issuance could total $1 trillion for the year, potentially causing a strain on liquidity in financial markets.