EGX 30 Ends Below 5220 Pts On Pending Egypt-IMF Loan

The Egyptian Exchange (EGX) has extended its opening losses by the end of Monday’s sessions. The EGX has incurred losses of EGP 3.8 billion during Monday’s closing session for the market is in full alert of whether cash-strapped Egypt would obtain the International Monetary Fund’s long-awaited US$ 4.8 billion in May as the country’s central bank chief said or within the fourth quarter of 2013 as EFG-Hermes said.

The capital market has reached to EGP 356.770 billion during Monday’s closing session.

The EGX indices ended Monday in red notes.

Egypt’s benchmark index EGX30 dropped by 0.73% to close at 5215.49 p; while the EGX20, it also pushed down by 1.85% to end at 6050.91 p.

Meanwhile, the mid- and small-cap index, the EGX70 dipped by 0.39% to conclude at 451.1 p.  Price index EGX100 tumbled by 0.52% to finish 745.93 p.

During Monday’s closing, the trading volume hit 83.080 million securities, higher than Sunday’s 70.808 million securities, representing an increase of 12.272 thousand securities. For the traded value, it reached EGP 262.462 million, exchanged through 13.088 thousand transactions.

This was after trading in 162 listed securities; 92 declined, 33 advanced; while 37 keeping their previous levels.

The non-Arab foreigners and Arabs were net sellers seizing 12.48% and 2.36% respectively, of the total markets, with a net equity of EGP 26.161 million and EGP 567.604 thousand excluding the deals.

Meanwhile, Egyptians were net buyers seizing 85.16% of the total markets, with a net equity of EGP 26.728 million, excluding the deals.

Egypt Sees IMF Loan Deal In May: Hisham Ramez

IMF is really concerned to support Egypt, the IMF chief Christine Lagarde affirmed to the Egyptian delegation attending the IMF-World Bank Annual Meetings in Washington.

The Governor of the Central Bank of Egypt (CBE) Hisham Ramez heads the delegation, which is comprised of the Minister of Finance El-Morsi El-Sayed Hegazy and the Minister of Planning and International Cooperation Ashraf Al Araby to attend the annual IMF-World Bank Annual Meetings in Washington.

The Egyptian government expects to reach an agreement with the IMF to secure the long-awaited US$ 4.8 billion loan next May after finalizing the economic reform plan, Hisham Ramez said.

On the sidelines of the meetings held with IMF, he revealed that Lagarde will issue a statement within hours to announce the details and conditions of the loan and the date of signing the deal.

EFG-Hermes: Egypt Will Not Get IMF Loan Before Q4/13

Cash-strapped Egypt will not obtain the International Monetary Fund’s long-awaited US$ 4.8 billion loan before the fourth quarter of 2013, EFG-Hermes Research said on Monday.

The delay in receiving IMF’s loan will add more pressures on the country’s domestic currency which is in fact going through a severe decline driven by the current economic woes, Hermes added.

In its recent research, EFG-Hermes Research further noted that to get the IMF’s financial support, Egypt has to adopt a number of austerity measures, highly controversial to citizens. That implies tax hikes and politically risky cuts in the generous system of state subsidies for fuel and food, including bread.

EFG-Hermes explained that the state of not reaching a final agreement between Egypt and the International lender during last week talks would later reflect more unrelenting pressures on the country’s economy.

“We see limited chances for an IMF deal in the short term, expecting it instead in Q4/13. To that end, we expect the EGP to come under renewed pressure towards mid-2013, if not earlier. The government has done little in implementing meaningful fiscal reforms thus far. The draft budget of FY2013/14 shows an unrealistic timeline for reforms, where the government expects to take a number of inflation-generating reform initiatives in less than eight months. We revise our economic forecasts for Egypt on page 13,” Hermes stated