The Bank of England sold 3.843 billion pounds of long-dated and index-linked gilts today, taking to 14.02 billion pounds the total volume of these bonds it has sold since starting to unwind earlier emergency purchases two weeks ago.
Wednesday's sale was the largest in a single day at the BoE's sales window, which take place three times a week.
Sales reflect the volume of demand, and are not pre-determined, unlike the BoE's recent auctions to sell a total 6 billion pounds of short- and medium-dated gilts bought under its main quantitative easing programme.
Thirty-year gilts have underperformed against German debt since the sale programme started, and after Wednesday's result the 30-year gilt yield hit its highest since November 9 at 3.776%, up 6 basis points on the day.
The BoE has now sold almost three quarters of the 19.3 billion pounds of government bonds it bought between September 28 and October 14, when it stepped in to stabilise the market after prices slumped after September's mini-budget.
The BoE rejected 628.3 million pounds of bids submitted by investors during Wednesday's purchase window.
