Mnuchin Says Treasury May Forego Seasonal Cuts to Bill Issuance

(Bloomberg) -- Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin indicated the U.S. will keep issuing debt at a steady pace as he seeks to fund a possible extension of the April 15 tax filing deadline.

Treasury’s bill issuance was set to fall in the second quarter as it historically does due to seasonal factors related to tax filings. Issuance drops as tax season approaches because the federal government can rely on incoming tax revenue to fund itself.

Treasury had already started cutting its bill issuance ahead of the tax deadline, lowering the size of this week’s three- and six-month bill sales by $3 billion each.

Mnuchin said he supports extending the 2019 tax-filing deadline beyond April 15 to provide relief from economic disruption caused by the coronavirus outbreak, and he’ll recommend that step to President Donald Trump.

“We’re already working on funding that -- that shouldn’t be an issue since we would have been downsizing our Treasury bills programs,” Mnuchin said Wednesday to reporters on Capitol Hill.

Mnuchin said that the tax extension would apply to individuals and small- and medium-sized businesses.

“That will have the impact of putting $200 billion back into the economy and that will create a very big stimulus,” he said.

--With assistance from Alexandra Harris.

To contact the reporters on this story: Saleha Mohsin in Washington at smohsin2@bloomberg.net;Liz Capo McCormick in New York at emccormick7@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Alex Wayne at awayne3@bloomberg.net, Joshua Gallu

©2020 Bloomberg L.P.