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Egypt's foreign debts reach $82bn

May 31, 2018 at 9:03 am

Egyptian currency [Flickr/Emi Moriya]

Egypt’s foreign debt rose by 23 per cent in 2017 to $82.9 billion, the Central Bank of Egypt (CBE) announced yesterday.

Egypt has expanded borrowing from foreign countries due to the financial and economic crises the country has faced.

Foreign debt amounted to $67.3 billion in 2016.

Public debt has increased to five times the amount it was five years ago, experts have said, “a dangerous indication that the national economy is regressing”.

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This can only be reduced by increased GDP and giving people greater spending ability.

Earlier this year Cairo floated $4 billion international bonds and later sold $2.5 billion international bonds for the first time in two tranches.

Central Bank Governor Tarek Amer has however previously said: “External debt levels and services are not at all worrying. We have much greater capabilities and we can bear more debts.”

At the end of 2017, the external debt ratio rose to 36.1 per cent of GDP, compared to 28.7 per cent in 2016.