Egypt central bank keeps key interest rates unchanged

Egypt’s central bank decided on Thursday to keep its key interest rates steady.

The central bank’s monetary policy committee (MPC) held its overnight deposit rate at 13.25 percent and its overnight lending rate at 12.25 percent.

In January, Egypt’s annual urban consumer inflation surged to 7.2 percent, from 7.1 percent in December after dropping to as low as 3.1 percent in October, its slowest since December 2005.

Egypt is emerging from a three-year IMF-backed economic reform programme that witnessed inflation jumping as high as 33 percent during 2017.

“MPC decided that keeping key policy rates unchanged remains consistent with achieving the inflation target of 9 percent (±3 percentage points) in 2020 Q4 and supporting the disinflation path over the medium-term,” the Egyptian central bank said in a statement.

Source: Reuters