Egyptian pound continues to freefall against dollar

The Egyptian pound continues its decline against the US dollar as it continues its dramatic freefall that has been in effect for the past couple of months, Almesryoon News reported yesterday.

Earlier this month, the Egyptian authorities announced that the floating exchange rate of the Egyptian pound had been fixed to 8 Egyptian pounds per dollar. Before its price was floated, one dollar was exchanged for 16 Egyptian pounds on the black market.

According to several indices and tables of data presented by Almesryoon News, the exchange rate of the Egyptian pound has now actually worsened and dollar-pound exchange rates have now hit a woeful ratio of 1:18.

The decline of the exchange rate of the Egyptian pound means much trouble in the already decaying Egyptian economy, that has been pummelled severely despite President Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi promising reforms.

Egyptian authorities expected that the $12 billion loan from the IMF would improve the Egyptian economy, yet the news of the loan did nothing to increase investor and domestic confidence, leading to the value of the Egyptian pound to continue declining.

Amidst the pound crisis, Saudi Arabia suspended monthly oil shipments to Egypt and this aggravated the economic crisis, which led the government to raise prices of several basic commodities such as fuel and even baby formula.