Egypt’s Central Bank keeps Interest Rates ‘Unchanged’

The Central Bank of Egypt (CBE) has decided to keep interest rates unchanged, after the bank’s Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) met Thursday.

The bank kept the overnight deposit rate, the overnight lending rate, and the rate of the CBE’s main operation unchanged at 8.75 percent, 9.75 percent, and 9.25 percent respectively, read the CBE’s statement.

The discount rate remained at 9.25 percent.

A spike in Egypt’s inflation rate in May lowered the chances that the CBE would cut interest rates, despite expectations for inflation to fall back in the coming months, Jason Tuvey, economist at Capital Economics said in a statement on Wednesday to Ahram Online.

Egypt’s annual headline inflation hit a five-year peak in May at 13.11 percent compared to 10.96 percent in April.

The MPC has yet to disclose the full statement explaining the decision.