The Treasury Department will sell $72 billion in notes and bonds next week in its quarterly refunding auctions, the government said Wednesday. The department will auction $32 billion in 3-year notes on May 8, $24 billion in 10-year notes on May 9 and $16 billion in 30-year bonds on May 10. Treasury has maintained this same auction sizes for ten straight quarters starting in November 2010. The auctions will refund $36.7 billion in maturing securities and will raise approximately $35.3 billion. A Treasury official said the department expected to hold the size of future refundings stable. In a surprise to some, the Treasury official said the department was not ready to make a final decision on whether to issue floating-rate notes. A Treasury official said the department was still reviewing comments on the new notes and wanted to take time to make a prudent decision on the final terms of the notes. The officials refused to put a time frame on when the department might make a decision.

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