The government is overhauling its bond pricing conventions to match global standards as it nears potential inclusion in JPMorgan Chase & Co.’s emerging-market index, a move expected to trigger billions of pesos in foreign inflows.

National Treasurer Sharon P. Almanza told reporters last week that the government has made significant progress on major requirements, including the implementation of tax treaty agreements, while the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) manages market liquidity and repurchase agreements (repo).

“We’ve made strides and seen many improvements. On liquidity, we now have the tax treaty in place for applicable agreements, and on the BSP side, the interest rate swap (IRS) has also helped support liquidity and repo operations,” Almanza said.

She added that the Bureau of the Treasury (BTr) is focusing on aligning its bond pricing conventions with international standards.

For one, the national treasurer explained, withholding tax is currently included in the computation of premiums and discounts, unlike in other countries where bond prices are quoted gross.

As such, Almanza shared that the government is “working with the industry on how to transition to the global standard, where bond prices do not net out the tax.”

Recall that in 2025, JPMorgan Chase placed the country’s peso-denominated government bonds on a positive watchlist for potential inclusion in its Government Bond Index–Emerging Market (GBI-EM) series.

This index is the industry standard for tracking local-currency emerging market debt and is followed by global fund managers.

Almanza said she is hopeful the peso bond will be included soon, following at least six months of assessment by the JPMorgan index team. The announcement is expected within the first quarter of 2025.

Almanza earlier old the Manila Bulletin that the Philippines could attract more than $2 billion, or approximately ₱114 billion, in additional foreign investment with the expected one percent weighting in JPMorgan’s influential index. This is on top of the current inflows the Philippines has been receiving from foreign investors.

Meanwhile, the Treasury raised ₱297.9 billion from its 10-year fixed-rate bond offering, combining new money and bond switches.

Of the total, ₱62.9 billion came from tendered eligible bonds, while ₱235 billion was from new money—including ₱107.1 billion via the rate-setting auction and ₱127.93 billion through the TAP facility.

Almanza told reporters that the latest notes auction, which occurs once per year, will be followed by retail treasury bonds (RTBs), although the timing is yet to be determined.

Further, the government is exploring potential assets for Sukuk issuance and is coordinating with the Department of Finance–attached Privatization Management Office (PMO) to identify usable options.

“The PMO is also looking at assets that can be privatized, so there are two roles. For assets that cannot be privatized, we need to identify which ones we can use,” said Almanza.