Pre-Trading Thoughts

Monthly urban headline CPI inflation recorded 1.6% in March 2025 compared to 1.4% in February. On an annual basis, urban inflation recorded 13.6% compared to 12.8% in February. 

Egypt’s Fuel Automatic Pricing Committee raised on Friday prices of gasoline and diesel by EGP2, but kept diesel fuel supplied to electricity, food industries, and vehicle gas unchanged.

Fitch Ratings affirmed Egypt's Long-Term Foreign-Currency Issuer Default Rating (IDR) at 'B' with a Stable Outlook. 

S&P Global Ratings revised Egypt’s outlook to stable from positive and maintained its B-/B rating for Egypt’s long- and short-term local and foreign currency debt. 

The MPC is scheduled to meet on Thursday to decide on interest rates. We believe the current scene might induce the CBE to act conservatively with a moderate easing, given the uncertainties sweeping global markets triggered by Trump’s trade war in addition to persistent geopolitical risks. Despite the pick-up in inflation reading for March and given the decline in core inflation rate, and also taking into account the current uncertainties, we still believe the CBE has the room to ease by up to 200 bps in its upcoming meeting on 17 April 2025.

The Madbouly government has plans to set up two integrated textile industrial zones in Minya and Fayoum at a total cost of EGP27 billion.

Private companies accounted for 72% of Egypt’s wheat imports in 1Q25, while the government secured the remaining 28%. 

Total interbank market transactions surpassed the USD3.5 billion mark last week, a significant jump from the USD750 million-1.2 billion the market usually sees changing hands each week. 

Egyptian National Railways signed three contracts worth over USD235 million with US-based Progress Rail to upgrade and maintain parts of the country’s locomotive fleet. 

Some 100 Saudi investors and members of the Saudi-Egyptian Business Council led by the Federation of Saudi Chambers landed in Cairo yesterday to kick off a visit aimed at deepening investment ties between the Kingdom and Egypt.

Egypt is set to officially join the EU’s research and innovation funding program Horizon Europe in November. 

The British Ambassador to Egypt said that his country is currently studying a trade agreement with Egypt aimed at reducing customs duties on some products imported by Cairo from Britain, in exchange for the export of Egyptian agricultural crops such as grapes and strawberries to the United Kingdom.

Italian company Eni has begun negotiations with global entities, led by Baker Hughes, to implement a plan to drill two new wells in the Zohr field in the Mediterranean Sea, with estimated investments ranging between USD300 million and USD400 million.

Data from the CBE revealed that the Ministry of Finance sold on Thursday approximately EGP116.5 billion in six-month and one-year T-bills, surpassing the targeted EGP75 billion in liquidity. 

The European Union has reduced the initial anti-dumping duty applied to hot-rolled flat steel products from Egypt to 12.8% from the 15.6% it proposed late last month.

DOMT’s general assembly approved cash dividends distribution of EGP0.85/share for FY24, implying payout ratio of 47.9% and dividend yield of 3.6%. Dividends will be distributed in May 2025.