Egypt achieves primary surplus of LE7.1B in Q3

CAIRO - 12 October 2019: Egypt achieved a primary surplus of LE7.1 billion during the third quarter of fiscal year 2019/2020 [July-September], said Minister of Finance Mohamed Ma’it during a meeting with President Abdel Fatah El Sisi on Saturday.

The results of the fiscal performance showed that the governmental investments amounted to LE24.9 billion in the same period, of which about LE22 billion investments funded by the Treasury, with an increase of 20 percent compared with the same period of previous fiscal year, added Mait.

According to the minister, the public debt is already declining; the ratio of government debt to GDP has dropped from 108 percent at the end of June 2017, to 90.2 percent in June 2019.

President Sisi directed to continue exerting efforts to reduce public debt and budget deficit, and to provide a stable environment that promotes confidence in the performance and Egyptian economic ability to attract more investments, said Presidential Spokesperson Bassam Radi in a statement.

On September 12, 2019, the Central Bank of Egypt (CBE) revealed in its monthly bulletin that domestic public debt rose 18.8 percent or LE 97 billion by the end of March 2019 to hit LE 4.2 trillion, up from LE 3.5 trillion in the same month of the prior year.

The bulletin showed that the domestic public debt represented 79 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP) by the end of March, compared to 77.1 percent by the end of 2018.

(US $1 = LE16.29)