{"id":8034,"date":"2017-07-03T16:47:44","date_gmt":"2017-07-03T16:47:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.aldiplomasy.com\/en\/?p=8034"},"modified":"2017-07-03T16:47:44","modified_gmt":"2017-07-03T16:47:44","slug":"dollar-rate-drops-below-egp-18-for-first-time-in-months","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.aldiplomasy.com\/en\/?p=8034","title":{"rendered":"Dollar rate drops below EGP 18 for first time in months"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The official exchange rate of the greenback has slipped to under EGP 18 for the first time in several months, state-owned MENA news agency reported.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The dollar has dropped to an average rate of 17.95 at Egypt\u2019s largest private bank, the Commercial International Bank (CIB), and 17.91 at the state-owned National Bank of Egypt (NBE) and Banque Misr, according to a survey conducted by Ahram Online on Monday.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Central Bank of Egypt (CBE) still maintains an average rate of EGP 18.08.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Experts told MENA that the availability of the greenback in banks is on the rise, with some banks facing a drop in liquidity in domestic currency amid growing demand.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Hany Farahat, a senior economist at Cairo-based CI Capital, told Ahram Online that there have been several developments that have had a positive impact on the rate of the EGP.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Farahat says that banks are seeing a greater inflow in foreign currency and an almost nine-fold increase in foreign investment in domestic debt instruments since the floating of the pound in November 2016.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

On Monday, the CBE said there was $54 billion in foreign inflow and a surplus of $8 billion since November\u2019s flotation.<\/strong><\/p>\n

In June, the CBE lifted the limits on foreign currency transfers set in January 2014 to control a dollar shortage.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Fitch Ratings said on Monday that the removal of foreign-currency transfer limits increases the availability of foreign currency, which allows banks to provide loans needed by foreign currency borrowers, particularly importers.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cThe banks no longer have any outstanding demands for imports,\u201d Farahat said, adding that the 2 percent increase in interest rates in May has also had a positive impact on the pound’s exchange rate.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The CBE is expected to implement another raise in interest rates to face the fuel hikes during its upcoming Monetary Policy Committee meeting on Thursday.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Since May, the deposit rate, loan rate and the rate of the CBE\u2019s main operations have increased to 16.7 percent, 17.75 percent and 17.25 percent respectively.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cAll this increases demand for the domestic currency,\u201d Farahat said.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The drop in the exchange rate comes days after Egypt announced a new cut in energy subsidies under the government’s five-year plan to gradually scrap its fuel subsidy bill from the state budget.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Fuel subsidy cuts were part of an economic reform package adopted in July 2014 that aimed to ease the country’s growing budget deficit and secure a $12 billion loan package from the IMF.<\/strong><\/p>\n

* This is according to ahramonline..<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The official exchange rate of the greenback has slipped to under EGP 18 for the first time in several months, state-owned MENA news agency reported. The dollar has dropped to an average rate of 17.95 at Egypt\u2019s largest private bank, the Commercial International Bank (CIB), and 17.91 at the state-owned National Bank of Egypt (NBE) …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8035,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[388],"tags":[2072,3440,3439,2147,2582,1460,1469,3441,3220,1653],"class_list":["post-8034","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-slide","tag-2072","tag-below","tag-dollar","tag-drops","tag-egp","tag-first","tag-for","tag-in-months","tag-rate","tag-time"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aldiplomasy.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8034","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aldiplomasy.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aldiplomasy.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aldiplomasy.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aldiplomasy.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8034"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.aldiplomasy.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8034\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aldiplomasy.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/8035"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aldiplomasy.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8034"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aldiplomasy.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8034"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aldiplomasy.com\/en\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8034"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}