Scatec Solar to invest USD 650 mn in Egypt

The Panama Papers are back: The people at International Consortium of Investigative Journalists have been busy structuring data about 320,000 companies and trusts into a single, searchable database. We’ve only just gotten started browsing through, whether you browse for “Egypt” (then click to view by offshore entity, officers, intermediaries or address) or search, there seems to be a fair bit of material to mull. Or start your own search from their landing page.

The EGP lost strength again yesterday, dropping below EGP 11 again on the parallel market, where Al Mal found greenbacks changing hands for EGP 11.05 to USD 1.

We’ll be keeping an eye out for news coming out of the Business News Foundation’s Third Annual Energy Conference: Energy and Sustainable Development, which kicks off today at the InterContinental Hotel Citystars Cairo. Register here.

Sharm El Sheikh will be home this week to the International Telecommunication Union’s Global Symposium for Regulators 2016. (The ITU is the UN’s agency in charge of everything from the allocation of global radio spectrum to satellite orbits — and the technical standards that ensure you can roam when you travel, among other things.)

The Egyptian Capital Market Association’s 20th anniversary takes place next week at the Four Seasons Nile Plaza Hotel’s Plaza Ballroom on 17 May 2016. Pharos Holding is platinum sponsor of the event. The occasion gets underway at 5pm with registration and networking, followed by remarks by ECMA Chairman Dr. Mohamed Taymour, Egyptian Financial Supervisory Authority Chairman Sherif Samy and Investment Minister Dalia Khorshid. The evening will feature dinner and live entertainment. Joining for a panel discussion headlined “Egypt: For a Better Future” and chaired by Dr. Hany Sarie El Din are:

• Former Foreign Minister and Arab League Secretary General Amr Moussa
• Former Finance Minister of Finance Dr. Ahmed Galal
• Former Minister of Trade and Industry Mounir Abdelnour (who also served as minister of tourism)
• Former Deputy Prime Minister of Egypt for Economic Development Dr. Ziad Bahaa El Din (who also served as minister of international cooperation)

Ticket information and other details of the event are available from Dalia Younis (01021188844 | dalia.younis@excellentdandn.com).

The National Telecommunications Regulatory Authority will invite Vodafone, Etisalat, Orange Egypt and Telecom Egypt to officially apply for 4G mobile licenses today, said ICT Minister Yasser Al Qady (runtime: 5:36). NTRA sources tell Amwal Al Ghad, however, that the invitations have already been sent out. Al Qady also confirmed that the licenses will be auctioned off to bidders who can meet technical and financial qualifications. We’re taking the minister’s explicit emphasis of the basics as a clear message to players such as Noor ADSL that have mumbled lately about there being no bar to their applying for a 4G license.

…Telecom Egypt (TE) will begin offering mobile services using rival operators’ networks at first if it secures one of the 4G licences, an ICT Ministry official told Bloomberg’s Tamim Elyan. The plans to sell 4G licences will include a spectrum allotment allowing TE to offer wireless services in Egypt, a source said. “The plan replaces an earlier one that some mobile operators threatened to fight in international arbitration. Mobile carriers … were concerned that a new competitor would eat into their market share, the telecommunications regulator said at the time,” but a Beltone Financial analyst says the Egyptian government will not let the situation “escalate into threats of arbitration this time and has been seeking feedback from the carriers and working to settle disputes with Telecom Egypt.”

TE can afford to build us all a nice, fast network: Yesterday’s news came as TE recorded a more than 115% uptick in net profit after tax to EGP 1.196 bn. The fixed-line monopoly brought in revenues of EGP 3.065 bn during the quarter, up 11% y-o-y. The company also captured 74.8% of the ISP market through its subsidiary TE Data, adding 184k new customers to its base, according to a regulatory filing. Apparently, TE doesn’t worry much about the Egyptian Competition Authority reading its earnings releases.

What does 4G mean to me? Data speeds on a high-quality 4G network can be as much as 5-7 times faster than 3G, so faster downloads and better video streaming should be among the benefits. Also: Poorer battery life. Trust us, you’ll be learning how to manually enable and disable LTE on your phones.

What should I look out for? If you’re old enough to remember the rollout of 3G in Egypt, you’ll remember that network quality and geographical coverage will be among the key issues. Also at issue for those who buy their phones abroad or on the grey market will be whether Egyptian carriers launch networks on frequencies compatible with the LTE bands baked into your current phones.

Orascom Construction (OC) was awarded two additional contracts worth EUR 270 mn to execute the civil and track work for the third phase of Cairo Metro Line 3. The awards bring OC’s share of the third phase of Cairo Metro Line 3 to EUR 375 mn. OC says the third phase of the project “will stretch across 18 km of tunnelling and viaduct works which will include 15 elevated, grade and underground stations. Both new contracts will be executed by Egyptian-French consortiums that have worked repeatedly on Cairo Metro. Orascom will complete the civil package in a consortium with VINCI, Bouygues and Arab Contractors, and the track works package in a consortium with with TSO (NGE Group) and ETF, a subsidiary of Eurovia. Funding for the third phase of Cairo Metro Line III is provided by French and European entities.”

The CEO of global giant Scatec Solar says the company is pumping investments worth USD 650 mn into five solar energy projects in Egypt with a combined generation capacity of 250 MW, per an interview with the Daily News Egypt. While we had reported in February that the European Investment Bank was considering funding all five projects, CEO Raymond Carlsen tells DNE the company has agreed with seven different banks to finance 75% of the projects, with lenders stepping up to the plate including the International Finance Corporation, European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, and government-owned Norwegian Investment Fund for Developing Countries, Norfund. Scatec plans to launch three solar facilities in Benban with a capacity of 150 MW and signed on with two companies to participate in two installations in Zafarana with a capacity of 100 MW.

Natural gas supplies to industry remain steady, an official from EGAS told Al Mal, denying there have been delays in the arrival of LNG shipments at the nation’s FSRUs. EGAS is presently meeting 100% of the natural gas needs of SMEs in the industrial sector and 90% of the demand from heavy industry. EGAS was not notified by cabinet of any decision to amend pricing to factories, an official added in reference to a recent flap over the possibility of steel producers paying less for natural gas, noting that EGAS does not have the authority to change the prices.

Lower sales, higher prices in used car market: Egypt’s market for used vehicles has shrunk considerably as fewer new cars are imported, traders told Al Mal. The number of cars on offer in the used-car market have dropped significantly as motorists looking to replace their vehicles with new ones are being affected by the currency shortage and customs restrictions, which has seen inventories of both new imported models and locally assembled vehicles shrink. Some dealers told the paper that used-car prices for mid-range models have gone up by EGP 5-10k, with a bigger jump expected for higher-end models. (Read in Arabic)

The number of tourists visiting Egypt fell for the fifth consecutive month by 47.2% y-o-y in March, according to CAPMAS data (paywall). Egypt saw 440.7k tourists visit in March compared to 834.6k tourists last year, the state statistics body said on Monday. West Europeans top the visitor’s list, making up 37.2% of total tourists in March. They’re followed by Middle Easterners at 28.2% and East Europeans at 12.8%. “The countries sending the most tourists in each region are Germany, Saudi Arabia, and Ukraine,” Ahram Online quotes CAPMAS as saying. The figures seem to confirm sentiments from head of the Red Sea Tourism Investment Association Kamel Abu Al, who said the government’s aim of attracting 10 mn tourists over a period of six months is unrealistic, we reported yesterday.

Arab Legal Consultants handles incorporation work for New Administrative Capital: The New Administrative Capital Company for Real Estate Development held its inaugural board meeting, Ahmed Weshahi, partner at Arab Legal Consultants and legal counsel to the New Administrative Capital project announced. The company is the entity responsible for constructing the new administrative capital and has paid-in capital of EGP 6 bn coming from the Armed Forces and the the New Urban Communities Authority, Al Shorouk writes. Ayman Ismail was elected chairman of the company’s board and Mohamed Abdel Latif as managing director during the course of the meeting.

President Abdel Fattah El Sisi’s approval ratings among young people fell to 79% from 90%, said the head of the Egyptian Center for Public Opinion Research (Baseera) Maged Osman in a call-in to Hona Al Asema on CBC (runtime: 1:54:22 — the segment on Baseera begins in 3:42). Osman added that while the president remained popular, the government must alter its message to properly engage with the youth. The survey results are here in pdf.

Expect the Brexit debate to go into high gear this week with speeches due from the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the governor of the Bank of England, and the head of the IMF. Some 20% of voters are still undecided ahead of the June 23 referendum, with UK Prime Minister David Cameron tugging at heartstringsin a speech on Monday urging Britons in a patriotic appeal not to vote to leave the EU. The Financial Times (paywall) takes yet another look at the pros and cons of the move, while Bloomberg reminds us that the GBP has been the developed world’s worst-performing currency this year.

As the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development sets to meet this week for its 25th anniversary, the Financial Times (paywall) tells us that the bank is proving its flexibility since it had to cease new investments in Russia, which “had long been its biggest lending market.” Sir Suma Chakrabarti, the bank’s president since 2012, tells the FT that it’s managed to boost annual investments to a record EUR 9.4bn last year despite the setback. “The good news is in the last couple of years we’ve been pushing reform, reform, reform, our ‘more for more’ agenda — the more reform you do, the more we can invest — and that has begun to pay off,” he says.

The drumbeat of stories in the global press condemning Egypt’s human rights track record gained speed yesterday, with celebrities joining the United Nations and media outlets in their criticism.

Woody Allen among 120 writers asking El Sisi to free Ahmed Naji: Woody Allen, Margaret Atwood, J. M. Coetzee, Jessica Hagedorn, David Henry Hwang and Orhan Pamuk were among at least 120 writers and artists to sign a letter sent to President Abdel Fattah El Sisi urging him to release writer Ahmed Naji, according to the New York Times. The letter was sent by freedom of expression advocacy group PEN America ahead of its annual Literary Gala in New York on 16 of May when Naji will be given the group’s annual Freedom to Write award. “Writing is not a crime,” reads the letter, calling the sentencing “emblematic of the Egyptian government’s deeply troubling crackdown on free expression.” Naji was sentenced to two years in prison in February for “violating public morals” with passages he wrote in his novel “A Guide for Using Life.”

Three UN human rights advocates on Monday called on Egypt to end “disproportionate reactions” against the rights to assembly and expression. “Security concerns should not be used as a pretext to harass journalists, lawyers and protestorsand ban peaceful political opposition, which will undermine not only public debate and fundamental rights, but security and long-term stability,” said the UN Special Rapporteurs on freedom of expression, David Kaye; on freedom of peaceful assembly and association, Maina Kiai; and on human rights defenders, Michel Forst. The experts condemned what they characterized as a harsh response to protesters, the jailing of journalists, lawyers, and human rights defenders, and the storming of the Press Syndicate.

Meanwhile, Curt Goering, Executive Director of the Center for Victims of Torture is calling on the US government to take a harsher stand against Egypt’s human rights violations, according to a piece in the Huffington Post. “The U.S. should press harder for an end to the crackdown, which has included dropping probes into NGOs’ funding from foreign sources, potential travel bans on activists, asset freezes and harassment of human rights activists. A timid response will only encourage an even harsher clampdown.”

The International Press Institute said on Monday: “The death sentences that an Egypt court recently recommended for three journalists in absentia are unjust and must not be allowed to stand.” Egypt sentenced two Al Jazeera journalists and four others to death in an espionage case on Saturday, we reported on Sunday. “We urge Egyptian officials not to approve or seek to implement these sentences and we call on other countries not to honour them. Journalism is not a crime and journalists should not face abuse, harassment or intimidation, much less the threat of state-sanctioned execution.”

The memo leak from the Interior Ministry continues to feature in the international press, ultimately becoming the cherry on top of a list of PR failures and systemic “incompetence” writes Mohamed Elmasry for Al Jazeera. The article highlights the Giulio Regeni case, the raid on the Press Syndicate, and the three-year-old toddler sentenced to life in prison for crimes allegedly committed when he was 17 months old.

In “LNG Industry Looks to Emerging Markets for Growth,” the Wall Street Journal notes that Egypt, Jordan and Pakistan are reshaping the dynamics of the global market for LNG, noting also that the spot market for LNG has grown from 8% of the total market in 2005 to 30% last year. With “over 100 mn tons of LNG due on the market by 2020, more consumers from emerging markets are needed,” the Journal says.

The Guardian has picked up on the news that the federation of Egyptian tourism agencies has paid USD 140k each in compensation to the families of three of eight Mexican tourists killed by accident last year when security forces on 13 September 2015 shot fire at them while on an excursion in the Western Desert. “The families of three of the victims have each received a bank transfer worth USD 140k,” said Ahmed Ibrahim, treasurer of the Egyptian Travel Agents Association. Ibrahim told AFP the payment was made after the three families agreed not to press charges against Egypt. “Negotiations are under way with the other five families in order to close the case definitively,” Ibrahim said.

Nestlé wants to sell you both sugary snacks and diabetes pills: As noted by France’s National Center for Scientific Research, sugar and candy “can not only substitute [for] addictive [substances] like cocaine, but can even be rewarding and attractive.” And still industry players including Nestlé condemn suggestions that sugar is addictive. Nestlé has built its USD 240 bn empire thanks in large part to sugar’s sway over the human mind, though the white stuff is starting to attract punitive measures from governments around the world. “In March, the UK followed Mexico in imposing a tax on sugary drinks in an effort to cut obesity. Saudi Arabia may follow.” Don’t worry, Egypt — as always — is bucking the trend by ensuring the sugar subsidy / cheap calorie / Type 2 diabetes ecosystem remains firmly in check. Nestlé is developing its own type of ecosystem, opening an ambitious lab to, among other things, find solutions to obesity. (Read Nestlé wants to sell you both sugary snacks and diabetes pills in Bloomberg)

360 video of a close range tornado in Colorado on Saturday: (Watch, running time: 7:53, drag the cursor on the video either while playing or paused to get a better look)

The US Embassy in Cairo issued a statement condemning the “terrorist attack in Helwan that killed several courageous members of the Egyptian police services.” The Embassy offered its sympathies to the families and friends of the victims and said the US “continues to stand with the Egyptian government and people in confronting terrorism.” The EU echoed the sentiment, with Ambassador James Moran, head of the European Union Delegation to Egypt, saying, “We condemn the heinous terrorist attack on a police vehicle in Helwan … Heartfelt condolences go out to the families of the victims of the terrorist attack.”

Shoukry to lead U.N. discussion on “ideological discourse of terrorist organizations”: Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry left for New York yesterday to head the Egyptian delegation at the UN Security Council, according to a statement from the ministry. Shoukry’s primary role is leading the council’s open ministerial conference on combatting the ideological discourse of terrorist organizations. Egypt holds the presidency of the Security Council for the month of May.

Saudi Arabia’s ambassador to Egypt, Ahmed Kattan, filed a court case accusing Ayman Nour of slander and using forged documents, according to a statement from the Saudi Embassy. Kattan says pre-revolutionary presidential-candidate-turned-dissident Nour used forged documents to claim Egyptian officials were given lavish gifts, including Rolex watches, by Saudi officials during King Salman’s visit to Cairo.

Egypt supports all efforts to end tensions in Palestine, “stop settlement activities, provide the necessary protection to the Palestinian people and create an atmosphere conducive to resolving the Palestinian issue through consolidated international efforts and initiatives,” President Abdel Fattah El Sisi said during a meeting with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. Abbas, who is in Cairo on a two-day visit, also met with Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry, who reiterated that Egypt supports international initiatives proposed on the Palestinian issue “to achieve the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people,” the SIS quotes Shoukry as saying. Violence had erupted along the Gaza border on Wednesday, according to Reuters, with senior Hamas official in exile, Moussa Abu Marzouk, saying “calm was restored after Egypt intervened to mediate a truce with Israel following 24 hours of fighting.”

Eni plans on doubling natural gas production from the Zohr field to 2 bcf/d by 2019, an unnamed senior official told Daily News Egypt. Production rates will increase to 2.7 bcf/d by 2020, he added. The company completed drilling a third well with promising results and is currently calculating new reserves, he said. It will begin drilling the fourth well in the Shorouk concession by next week and complete it within 30 days. As for the Noras field, Eni said further tests would be carried out on several new wells in the area according to Chief Exploration Officer Luca Bertelli, DNE reports. A study conducted by Bertelli showed there is a high possibility of gas production from the areas between north and south of Abo Madi “especially with the presence of two main reservoirs side-by-side.”

Siemens has delivered two steam-powered turbines producing 800 MW to the EUR 1 bn Beni Suef power plant, which is expected to begin producing power in November, Al Ahram reports. The plant will produce 4.8 GW once it is operational. (Read in Arabic)

Finance Minister Amr El Garhy approved EGP 2 bn in additional spending to buy wheat from domestic farmers; the funding will be appropriated from the food subsidy budget, Al Mal reports. The Finance Ministry had already spent EGP 1 bn for the current harvest. Prime Minister Sherif Ismail had ordered the ministry to free up EGP 1 bn on Monday to expedite the purchase of wheat from farmers after the process was stalled. As we reported yesterday, a number of farmers have complained that the backlog of procuring their wheat harvest is growing significantly as the government is unable to provide a suitable number of silos, according to Al Mal. Private traders have reportedly convinced farmers to sell the wheat to them instead, with one source saying the local harvest is being mixed with imported wheat; government officials deny the claim. As it stands, Egypt has bought a total of 1.3 mn tonnes of domestically grown wheat since the start of the official procurement season on 15 April, the Agriculture Ministry said, according to Reuters. Cabinet put the figure at 1.15 mn tonnes on Saturday. It would also appear that the Agriculture Ministry has raised its expected target from the harvest to 9 mn tonnes from an initial 4 mn, according to statements by the Agriculture Minister.

The factory rescue fund announced by Industry and Trade Minister Tarek Kabil in November will launch in the state’s FY2016-17 fiscal year and will stay at about EGP 150 mn in size despite promises by the head of the President’s Economic Development Council last year to triple the fund to EGP 500 mn. Sources tell Al Borsa that talks are being held with Ayadi and Tahya Masr to make contributions. The government will initially target 150 factories, out of around 871 faltering facilities. According to data from the Administrative Control Authority, there are around 1,600 factories facing bankruptcy at present.

Juhayna, the high-profile domestic dairy products company, is investing EGP 150 mn in 2016 as part of its expansion strategy to boost production levels at the El Marwa concentrates factory, and the El Dawleya juice factory by 50%, the company said in a statement. The plan involves boosting production at El Dawleya to 180k tonnes of fruit and 67,000 tonnes of concentrates at a total cost of EGP 50 mn, bringing the total investment value of the factory to EGP 300 mn. An additional EGP 100 mn will be invested into the factory increasing the production lines to 11 from eight. (Read in Arabic)

El Nasr Fertilizers, a subsidiary of the state-owned Holding Company for Chemical Industries, plans on investing EGP 100 mn in new projects in the next fiscal year, Chairman Mohamed Nasser told Al Borsa. The company has a development strategy that it will implement over FY 2016-17 and FY 2017-18, he added. The projects include an EGP 20 mn industrial wastewater treatment plant, in addition to restructuring, maintenance, and equipment upgrades, said Nasser. (Read in Arabic)

Ismailia’s governor has officially approved 17 mainly industrial projects worth a combined EGP 158 mn, Al Masry Al Youm reports. The projects include salt manufacturing, packaging, readymade clothes and textiles, and food factories. (Read in Arabic)

The Pharmacists Syndicate expects domestically manufactured Sovaldi to drop in price to EGP 450 after the Pharco factory, which provides the raw materials required to manufacture Sovaldi, comes online, Al Borsa reports. The factory is the first of its kind in Egypt, secretary general of the syndicate Ahmed Farouk Shaaban said. The Health Ministry had in March declared its intention to reduce the price of domestic analogues of Sovaldi to EGP 520 from EGP 2200. (Read in Arabic)

Palm Hills Developments posted a net profit after tax and minority interest of EGP 105 mn, down 43% y-o-y, the company announced in a regulatory filing. The drop came despite the company registering record sales of EGP 2.2 bn — Palm Hill’s highest ever quarterly rate of new sales. While the company rebased profits in 1Q2016, the drop in profitability was also driven by the adoption of a first-sold-first-delivered policy as well as a change in mix and type of units delivered. (Read)

The Tourism Ministry wants to organize an international tennis match featuring current world number five Rafael Nadal by the Pyramids as part of its promotional campaign, which has currently been focused on the GCC, said Tourism Minister Yahya Rashid in a call-in to Hona Al Asema with Lamees Al Hadidy on CBC (interview segment begins at 1:03:00). The ministry plans to announce a detailed timeline of its promotional campaigns next week, Rashid added. The minister phoned in from Spain where he is representing Egypt at the UN World Tourism Organization meeting.

Transport Minister Galal Saeed held discussions with representatives of the World Bank to fund the USD 400 mn purchase of 13 air-conditioned trains for the Cairo Metro Line 2, Al Borsa reports. The ministry is currently rolling out 20 of these trains for service in the Metro Line 1 at a cost of EGP 2.2 bn. The World Bank had previously provided the ministry with USD 600 mn for installations of railway signaling technology. (Read in Arabic)

Transport Minister Galal Saeed has reached an agreement with France’s Thales Group to complete the World Bank funded USD 270 mn Cairo-Alexandria railway line by December 2017, said the minister at a Transportation Ministry workshop. The Transport Ministry will also launch an international build-own-transfer tender to develop a new river bus line, said Saeed. (Read in Arabic)

The Central Bank of Egypt will unveil in September the contours of its plan to support the growth of SMEs, said head of the Supervisory Management Control and Supervision Sector at the CBE Rana Badawi. The CBE is looking to grow Egypt’s total base of loans to SMEs by as much as 20% under the initiative. (Read in Arabic)

Faisal Financial Investments, the investment arm of Faisal Islamic Bank, plans to launch a brokerage and risk-management firm with EGP 10 mn in capital, Amwal Al Ghad reports. Faisal Financial will seek regulatory approval for the company. The company had received regulatory approval to establish a EGP 100 mn company to manage Faisal Islamic Bank’s real estate assets. (Read in Arabic)

The House of Representatives is planning to begin deliberations on the FY2016-17 budget next week and is urging the ministers of finance and planning to give a presentation on the broad strokes of the budget before debate begins. The House is expected to pass the budget, said Hussein Issa, who chairs the House Planning and Budget Committee. However, the committee will make recommendations and amendments, including using sovereign bonds to finance projects and issuing certificates for national projects to the general public to fund them. (Read in Arabic)

The House of Representatives also voted to approve the first official coalition bloc in parliament — the Support Egypt coalition — Ahram Gate reports. With 315 members, the Support Egypt will be the largest bloc in parliament. Meanwhile, the parliament also discussed redrawing the borders of the governorates. The realignment will take place along latitudes, linking areas of the red Sea Governorates with Upper Egypt and place the disputed territory of Shalatin in the governorate of Aswan, said House Speaker Ali Abdel Aal. Furthermore, amendments to the Labor Unions Act were handed to the House Manpower Committee to make its recommendations, AMAY reports. While details of the amendments have not been made clear, this could affect unions such as the Press Syndicate and Doctors’ Syndicate, both of which been involved in acts of protests against the security service.

Egyptian officials handed Italian investigators “more phone records and written testimony,” judicial sources told Italian news agency ANSA. “It was not to be ruled out, sources said, that the other phone records handed over Sunday were those of a further eight people whose records Italy had asked for via an international diplomatic request,” ANSA reported.