The Federal Reserve entered the U.S.Government securities market and offered to buy all maturities
of Treasury notes and bonds, a Fed spokesman said.
    He said this coupon "pass," which adds permanent reserves
to the banking system, was for regular delivery tomorrow.
    Dealers said that Federal funds were trading at 6-7/16 pct
when the Fed announced the operation. Economists had been
expecting the Fed to do this because of the need to offset
seasonal factors expected to drain reserves heavily over the
next few weeks. The Fed had previously offered to buy all
coupon issues on March 31.
 Reuter
