Spain has sold €7.15 billion of bonds, half of its pension reserve fund, in a private sale, as it shores up financing amid efforts to avoid a European bailout.

The country sold €3.88 billion of debt at an auction, exceeding the maximum target of €3.5 billion.

In a separate transaction, it also sold €3.27 billion worth of notes maturing in September 2017 to the welfare reserve fund at a yield of 4.792 per cent, according to the official gazette and a spokesman at the economy ministry. The treasury has already sold all the bonds it had planned to issue this year.

– (Bloomberg)