The Egyptian stock exchange retracted Monday, amid huge selling purchases by Egyptian and Arab investors. Egypt index dropped 3.55 percent, closing at 13604.01 points – this is the least level since October of last year.
The net foreign purchases during Monday’s session reached EGP52 million, noted the Egyptian stock exchange Monday. The total of purchases during the session exceeded EGP203 million.
Economist Sharif Henry said that there is no major reason behind the collapse of the stock, but he expected the current underwritings such as Cairo For Investment & Real Estate Development and Sarwa Capital, not to mention the scheduled public offerings had a negative influence on the value and volume of stock in Egypt.
Henry told Asharq Al-Awsat that the value of public offerings will exceed 10-15 percent of the shares’ prices. He attributed this to investors’ liquidation of funds for these offerings.
He pointed to the volume of underwritings covered lately (Cairo For Investment & Real Estate Development and Sarwa Capital), expecting that a part of these underwritings' funds came from the stock which pushed shares hugely.
This coincides with a time when the Central Bank of Egypt said that the country’s net foreign reserves rose to $44.459 billion at the end of September 2018, compared to $44.419 billion at the end of July.
Egypt’s external debt increased 19.3 percent on an annual basis to USD88.2 billion end of March.
