US dollar exchange rate continues to decline in Egypt

US dollar exchange rate continued its decline against the Egyptian pound on Wednesday morning for the third day in a row, being bought at LE17.23 in 3 banks including the Commercial International Bank (CIB), one of the biggest private banks in Egypt.

The buying price is between LE17.24 and 17.29 for the rest of Egypt’s banks, amid projections that the rate will further decline during in the coming period driven by increased dollar liquidity in banks, and foreign currency reserves at the Central Bank of Egypt (CBE) which exceeded US$44 billion.

“The increase in remittances for Egyptians abroad and foreign exchange concessions is a major reason for the fall in the dollar price,” a banking source familiar with government run banks told Al-Masry Al-Youm.

The sources said that the National Bank of Egypt (NBE), Banque Misr, and CIB, are the largest banks with dollar resources and make the dollars available to other banks with a shortage of foreign currency through the interbank mechanism.

In the NBE, Banque Misr, the Suez Canal Bank, and the Arab African International Bank, the US dollar was sold at LE17.35 and bought at LE17.25 on Wednesday morning.

In the CIB the US dollar was sold at LE17.33 and bought at LE17.23. In Crédit Agricole, and Bank of Alexandria it is sold at LE17.34 and bought at LE17.24.

Abu Dhabi Islamic Bank sold the dollar at LE17.35, buying it at LE17.29.

Egypt floated the national currency on November 3, 2016. It devalued the Egyptian pound by about a third from the former peg of LE8.8 against the dollar and allowed it to drift lower.