Egypt will seek to raise as much as $6 billion from international bond sales through 2017, though the first issuance may be delayed due to market “volatility” after the election of Donald Trump, Finance Minister Amr El-Garhy said.

The government is still weighing whether to tap markets next week, El-Garhy said in an interview with Bloomberg Television in Cairo on Tuesday.

“We were planning to do it by end of November, but there has been volatility since the election in the United States,” he said. “The window is closing because by the second week of December the markets will be very quiet. So it’s either this or maybe by mid-January.”

Egyptian authorities are trying to reduce the government’s borrowing costs after abandoning currency controls this month. Foreign investors have cheered the currency float, which came before Egypt signed a $12 billion loan accord with the IMF, pouring funds into the country’s stock and bond markets. The most populous Arab country has struggled to revive its economy since the 2011 uprising that ended the three-decade autocratic rule of President Hosni Mubarak.

El-Garhy said the government may sell between $5 billion and $6 billion in international bonds through 2017, depending on financing needs.

The decision to float the currency was seen as crucial to ease a dollar shortage that had crippled business activity. Critics say the move will lead to an uncontrollable surge in inflation.

El-Garhy said authorities seek to gradually lower the inflation rate to 10 percent by mid-2017 from the current level of 13.6 percent as investments start to flow and the budget deficit narrows.

Source:
courtesy of BLOOMBERG

by Manus Cranny , Ahmed Feteha , and Tarek El-Tablawy

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