The Egyptian Minister of Planning, Hala Al-Saeed, said, on Tuesday, that the contracts for the sale of stakes in state-owned assets, which Egypt recently signed, included a deal to sell minority stakes in three companies in the oil and petrochemical sector to the Abu Dhabi Sovereign Wealth Fund, ADQ Holding, for 800 million. dollars, according to Reuters.
She added that the contracts also included a deal to raise $700 million by increasing the capital of a company that owns a group of hotels in Egypt, and a deal to sell a 31 percent stake in Al-Ezz Dekheila Steel Company for $241 million.
“All deals have ended and are binding,” the minister told Reuters after a press conference attended by senior cabinet members.
She added that the share in the hotels, which includes historical real estate in Cairo, Alexandria and Luxor, was granted to the Arab Company for Hotel and Coastal Investments (Ikon), the hospitality arm of the Egyptian “Talaat Moustafa Real Estate” group.
The planning minister told reporters that the deals the government expects to close, in the next few months, include a deal worth more than $300 million for a wind farm in Jabal al-Zayt, a stake in the army-owned National Petroleum Company, and a power station built by Germany’s Siemens.
On Tuesday, Egyptian Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly said that Egypt had signed contracts to sell stakes in state-owned assets worth $1.9 billion as part of a program to support the private sector and collect hard currency.
The sale of these stakes is seen as necessary for Egypt to ease long-standing pressure on the pound, attract much-needed dollars and launch economic reforms under a $3 billion International Monetary Fund loan programme.
Madbouly said that out of $1.9 billion, $1.65 billion will be paid in foreign currency.
The government had aimed to raise $2 billion from quota sales by the end of June, but its efforts have faced delays in the past few months, leading to a drop in the value of the pound on the parallel market.
Since the beginning of last year, the pound has lost about half of its value against the dollar, according to the official exchange rate, and inflation has reached record highs.
Madbouly said that the government has exceeded almost a quarter with regard to a list of 32 state companies that announced last year that it would sell stakes in them, and is preparing to sell stakes in other companies later.
He added that Egypt expects hard currency inflows to increase by $70 billion annually to $191 billion by 2026.
2023-07-11 23:55:22
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