The Egyptian Minister of Finance, Mohamed Maait, said the government of Egypt is considering offering bonds in the Gulf markets for the first time, saying the ministry is studying the possibility of issuing bonds in the UAE dirham and the Indian rupee as part of the ministry’s plans to diversify sources of income and tools of financing, currencies and issuance markets and expand the base and segments of international investors.
Minister Maait told the Emirates News Agency, WAM, on the sidelines of the Asian Financial Forum in Hong Kong, that offering bonds in the Gulf markets requires a great effort and arrangements with local and international advisors and the Financial Markets Committee in the Gulf states, referring to conversations with Christopher Hui Cheng Yu, Hong Kong Minister of Financial Services and Treasury on the possibility of issuing bonds in Hong Kong dollars also.
He explained that these issuances contribute to diversifying the debt portfolio so that it includes different markets, currencies, instruments, and investors from more than one party at a low financing cost, pointing to the recent issuance of green bonds worth $750 million, and sovereign bonds worth $1.5 billion, in addition to continuing to diversify international markets.
With the return again to the Japanese markets, the implementation of the second international issuance of “Samurai” bonds worth 75 billion Japanese yen, equivalent to about half a billion dollars, and the issuance of sustainable international bonds in the Chinese “Panda” financial market, which are allocated to finance projects worth about 3.5 billion Chinese yuan, equivalent to about half a billion dollars.
