Rates for three- and six-month US Treasury bills drop at weekly auction

Interest rates on short-term Treasury bills fell in Monday's auction.

The Treasury Department auctioned $24 billion in three-month bills at a discount rate of 0.020 percent, down from 0.035 percent last week.

Another $24 billion in six-month bills was auctioned at a discount rate of 0.095 percent, down from 0.135 percent last week.

The discount rates reflect that the bills sell for less than face value. For a $10,000 bill, the three-month price was $9,999.49, while a six-month bill sold for $9,995.20. That would equal an annualized rate of 0.020 percent for the three-month bills and 0.097 percent for the six-month bills.

Separately, the Federal Reserve said Monday that the average yield for one-year Treasury bills, a popular index for making changes in adjustable rate mortgages, edged down to 0.25 percent last week from 0.26 percent the previous week.