Egypt’s Finance Minister Determines Features of New Budget

Finance Minister, Momtaz al-Saeed said yesterday that an agreement was concluded with Saudi Arabia to sign a $500 million loan as of June 1st, in the form of bonds.

He explained that a $1 billion Saudi deposit at the Egyptian Central Bank of Egypt is currently being considered as a loan to finance Egypt’s new budget.

The statements came yesterday during a press conference to discuss the State budget’s most important features.

Meanwhile, he affirmed that a $3.2 billion loan agreement from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) came to an impasse due to concerns of the IMF over the political situation in Egypt.

He said that energy subsidies have been cut from EGP95.5 billion down to only EGP70 billion through raising the prices of natural gas to the companies that heavily consume gas. The subsidies reduction took place as of January, according to SIS.