China just bought into renewables in Egypt and MENA.
Plus: Mercedes, BMW customs disputes settled?

Don’t be fooled by the comparative quiet of this morning — we’re in the midst of a busy news cycle, and Mondays are always “slow” news morning. Driving the conversation today:

UK trade envoy Sir Jeffrey Donaldson is in town for two-day visit. He’s accompanied by two UK healthcare companies. It’s Donaldson’s tenth visit in three years, the UK embassy notes. We have more in Diplomacy + Foreign Trade, below.

Prime Minister Moustafa Madbouly is in Germany with a delegation of Egyptian companies, Al Akhbar reports. On the agenda, we think: Luring back German auto industry players including Mercedes, BMW and Bosch, the first two of which appear to be on the verge of settling outstanding customs disputes with Egypt, as we report in this morning’s Speed Round, below.

Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry will meet with Russian FM Sergey Lavrov in Moscow today, according to a ministry statement.

Also this week:

• It’s budget week in the House as MPs look to pass the FY2019-2020 budget before the 1 July start of the state’s new fiscal year.
• The Pharaohs next play on Wednesday at 10pm, taking on Congo as the African Cup of Nations continues. Check the standings here, or visit the Afcon website here.
• The G-20 summit takes place this weekend in Osaka, Japan, running 28-29 June. Among the expected highlights: Donald Trump and Xi Jinping are due to have a chat. Check the gathering’s website here.
• US Fed boss Jay Powell speaks on Tuesday evening (CLT) in New York in what look set to be some of his most closely-watched remarks so far this year. Is a July rate cut in the offing?

Did you know? Google says its products support at least EGP 5.2 bn worth of economic activity in Egypt. That’s one highlight from its soon-to-be-released Egypt economic impact report. We have more in Speed Round, below.

Slack has gone public with a once-unusual a direct listing,making its entry onto the New York Stock Exchange with a valuation of over USD 20 bn — more than three times what is was worth nine months ago — the FT reports. An increasing number of tech companies are considering direct listings (allowing their shares to trade on an exchange without offering stock for sale) after Spotify pioneered the move on Wall Street in April 2018. The workplace messaging app’s shares opened at USD 38.50 (a 22% premium to their last private-market trade) and inched slightly higher to close at USD 38.62, in what the salmon-colored paper terms “a smooth start to trading.”

Want more? Go read the Financial Times’ How non-engineer Stewart Butterfield reached top of Silicon Valley — the Slack CEO is a Canadian philosophy major who turned a failed gaming company into one of the world’s most visible enterprise tech firms.

Angel and early-stage investor conference to take place in El Gouna this fall: The Middle East Angel Investment Network (MAIN) is hosting Angel Oasis 2019, its conference for angel and early-stage investors in MENA, in Gouna from 31 October to 2 November, the organization said in a press release (pdf). Some 130 angel investors, VCs and other early-stage investors attended last year’s gathering.

Get ready this week for the first primary debates among candidates vying to become the Democrats’ challenger to The Donald in next year’s presidential election.Twenty of 24 declared candidates will appear on televised debates this Wednesday and Thursday, but the Wall Street Journal thinks five have separated themselves from the pack: Joe Biden, Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, Pete Buttigieg and Kamala Harris.

Taking a swing at El Face: Facebook’s proposed “Libra” cryptocurrency is a boon for its corporate backers, but not for users, the Wall Street Journal writes. The bottom line: “Do you trust Facebook and the big corporations and venture capitalists on the governing board not to misuse a license to print money?” Bloomberg looks at how central banks and other establishment figures are reacting to the story.

Three things outside Egypt worth knowing about this morning:

• The US is expected to impose sanctions on Tehran today in response to the downing of a drone on Thursday. Gulf equities closed in the red yesterday as tensions between Washington and Iran grew, Bloomberg reports.
• Ethiopia’s government put down an attempted coup in the country’s northern Amhara region, Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed said on national television. News followed that the army’s chief of staff and the governor of the Amhara region were killed in related attacks, according to AP. The failed coup was reportedly led by a high-ranking military officer.
• Turkey’s main opposition party won the mayoral race in Istanbul — again — in what the international press is positioning as a key loss President Tayyip Erdogan.

Could your professional decline be rather more imminent than you thought? A sobering thought, but according to this long read by social scientist Arthur C. Brooks in the Atlantic, it almost certainly is, with studies showing most of us will start a career in earnest at 30, peak around 50 and go into decline soon after that. Our chances of making a prizewinning scientific discovery, writing a bestselling novel, or helming a giant corporation at age 60 are slim, but that doesn’t necessarily mean we’ll be put out to pasture. The key, Brooke says, is developing the ability to use knowledge gained in the past, rather than relying on “raw intellectual horsepower” to sustain your peak accomplishment indefinitely.

PSA- We’re heading into a three-day long weekend, with next Sunday off in observance of the 30 June Revolution. If this doesn’t mark the start of peak summer, we don’t know what does.

It was a mixed bag on the nation’s talk shows last night:

Egypt’s economy could grow by more than 5% -World Bank official: Al Hayah Al Youm’s Khaled Abu Bakr highlighted statements from Mahmoud Mohieldin, the World Bank’s senior VP for the 2030 Development Agenda, who said that Egypt could further up its economic growth rate above the current 5% (watch, runtime: 01:54).

El Hekaya’s Amr Adib picked up on the WSJ piece we noted yesterday: The EGP has joined the Ukrainian UAH as one of the world’’s top-performing “exotic” currencies, gaining 6% against the greenback since the end of January (watch, runtime: 13:05).

Egypt may move to ban single-use plastic, MP Mohamed Amer told Adib (watch, runtime: 09:49). We have more on this in this morning’s Health section, below.

EXCLUSIVE- Dispute between Customs Authority and Mercedes-Benz importer finally settled? An Egyptian importer of Mercedes-Benz vehicles has won an EGP 700 mn customs refund after the cabinet’s dispute resolution committee ruled in favor of the company in its dispute with the Customs Authority, a government source told Enterprise. The company was initially asked to pay an extra EGP 700 mn in a dispute over the basis of calculation for import duties. The sum was held in trust by the authority while the dispute committee took up the case, and the authority has now transferred the EGP 700 mn back to the importer, our source said. The committee also ruled that the government’s trade representative in Germany must pass the invoices for shipments of all cars imported from Germany directly to the Customs Authority, the source said.

Background: The government originally reached a settlement with the company earlier this year, but the dispute resurfaced in April after the importer pushed back on the Customs Authority’s imposition of indicative pricing on cars. The company denied any wrongdoing, saying that as an importer it can sometimes get price breaks from Mercedes-Benz that the Customs Authority “does not acknowledge” in calculating the base price for customs. The dispute committee said at the time that it would be “difficult” to give the importer the customs rate it was seeking.

In related news: BMW signed yesterday an EGP 55 mn settlement with the customs authority, the source also told us. The Customs Authority reached in April an agreement with the German automotive giant to end a dispute over customs tariffs and valuations of imported cars.

Mercedes assembly plant still on the cards? The luxury car maker said in January it could “start” a new assembly plant in Egypt. It shut down its assembly line in mid-2015 amid FX shortages. Completely fully imported vehicles (also known as “CBU” in the trade) were also made cheaper in light of falling tariffs on EU-assembled cars, which hit zero at the start of this year.

INVESTMENT WATCH- Google is planning to start hiring a full team for its Cairo office, the Investment Ministry said in a statement yesterday. Google’s MENA Managing Director Lino Cattaruzzi told Enterprise in an interview that the hiring push, which will include tapping a new country manager, will begin soon. A Google spokesperson separately told us that Hesham Elnazer (LinkedIn), currently Google’s director of agencies for MENA and 15-year veteran of Mars, is set to fill the country manager position.

The hiring is the harbinger of more to come: “That’s the initial stone and then we are going to grow this over time based on the results and the impact we have,” Cattaruzzi told Enterprise. “We are trying to accelerate the work on the quality of our products and engagement with our partners on the content creation side and ecosystem and how to develop all these businesses so they can sell more online inside and outside Egypt.”

Google is also set to release soon its Egypt economic impact report, at which Enterprise got an exclusive first look. Among the statistics included in the report:

• Google products support at least EGP 5.2 bn-worth of economic activity in Egypt;
• Google plans to reach 100k people through its pro-bono digital training program “Maharat min Google” by the end of 2019, which will help nearly 25k people find new jobs or grow in their current ones;
• Google aims to get 200k businesses on Google My Business by the end of 2019 and will launch AdWords Express later this year.

M&A WATCH- China’s Silk Road Fund buys into Egypt renewable energy scene through acquisition of large Acwa Power stake: China’s state-owned Silk Road Fund has acquired a 49% stake in Saudi utility developer Acwa Power’s renewable energy unit, Arabian Business reports. No details of the investment have been released. The renewable energy platform, Acwa Power RenewCo, will own Acwa Power’s solar power and wind assets in Egypt, the UAE, South Africa, Jordan and Morocco, which have an aggregate generation capacity of nearly 1.7 GW, according to a press release. Acwa Power and the Chinese government investment fund have previously co-invested in two projects in the UAE.

Acwa is an emerging power in Egypt’s renewable energy sector: Late last year, Acwa and Hassan Allam signed a power purchase agreement with the Egyptian Electricity Transmission Company for a 2.3 GW, USD 2.3 bn power plant in Luxor, which is expected to operate at full capacity by 2023. Acwa also recently submitted the best-priced offer in the EETC’s tender to build a 200 MW solar power plant in Kom Ombo.

Key market: Acwa Power’s CEO Paddy Padmanathan has previously stated that Egypt is a core market for renewable energy sector growth and we noted in March that the company plans to invest USD 3 bn in Egypt this year, with funds directed to energy projects in Luxor and the Benban solar power complex in Aswan.

IPO WATCH- Steel manufacturer AlGioshy Steel is planning to offer up to 25% of its shares in an IPO next year to finance planned expansions, CEO Tarek AlGioshy tells the local press. The company has hired an adviser, but AlGioshy did not disclose who. A top company executive had said earlier this year that the company was looking to sell as much as 40% of its shares in its debut on the EGX. According to the exec, AlGioshy’s expansion plans include adding a second EGP 300 mn production line at its steel rebar factory in Sixth of October.

Background: The company had said in January that it was looking to IPO up to 40% of its shares in a transaction timed for 4Q2019. It also said at the time that it was lining up some EGP 500 mn to invest in a second production line at its rebar plant.

Are we on the cusp of a sukuk issuance spree? Two unnamed companies partially owned by the government have expressed their interest in issuing shariah-compliant sukuk bonds to finance new projects this year, sources tell Al Mal. One issuance would be worth EGP 1 bn, while the value of the other one has yet to be decided. One of the companies is said to be planning to issue the sukuk itself, while the second company will carry out the issuance through Sarwa Capital. Both have signalled interest to the Financial Regulatory Authority (FRA), the newspaper reports.

Background: The FRA issued regulations governing sukuk in April. The regulations stipulate that the bond issuances be approved by a religious committee and issued through an independent body that monitors issuances. It also said issuances must be worth at least EGP 50 mn. We reported yesterday that Abu Dhabi Islamic Bank’s investment banking unit Adib Capital Egypt is planning to request regulatory approval from the FRA for a sukuk issuance it is managing for an unnamed local company.

SMART POLICY- The House Industry Committee has finished drafting a bill that would regulate the use of plastic bags, AMAY reported. Egypt produces around 1.2 mn tons of plastic waste each year, committee chairman Mohamed Amer said. The Red Sea governorate said in April it would impose a ban on single-use plastics effective this month. The moves come as countries around the world move against single-use plastics: Canada, for example, plans to ban them by 2021, amid a growing global backlash against the product.

LEGISLATION WATCH- Maglis El Dawla completes review of SMEs, customs acts: The Council of State (Maglis El Dawla) has completed its review of proposed SMEs and customs acts and has sent them back to the Madbouly Cabinet for approval, unidentified sources tell the local press. Once Cabinet signs off on the bills, they will be shipped off to the House of Representatives for final sign-off.

What do the bills entail?

• Proposed amendments to the Customs Act would expedite customs clearance, create a “whitelist” of trusted importers, and broaden the Custom Authority’s discretion, according to the final draft released by the Finance Ministry last year.
• The SMEs Act includes a number of tax and non-tax incentives for SMEs to go legit. Government entities will also be working to issue licenses and ensure SMEs are included in tenders, government auctions, and banking facilities. SME tax incentives package could cost the government EGP 1.5-2 bn each year.

LEGISLATION WATCH- House to hold consultations on Consumer Credit Act with industry stakeholders: The House Economic Committee will begin holding hearings within the next few days on the government’s proposed Consumer Credit Act, inviting members of the Federation of Egyptian Industries, Federation of Egyptian Chambers of Commerce, and the Egyptian Union for Investors Associations to participate, committee member Medhat El Sherif tells Al Mal. Talks with the Financial Regulatory Authority (FRA) over the specifics of the bill are currently ongoing, El Sherif said.

What would the act do? The Madbouly government is positioning it as a move to regulate the nation’s fast-growing consumer credit industry, improve transparency, and protect customers. If passed, the bill would require consumer finance companies to obtain licenses from the FRA to sell goods on installment, among other stipulations. Retailers who make more than 25% of the annual sales on installment would also have to register. The House Economic Committee had signed off on the draft bill earlier this week.

REGULATION WATCH- Market regulator drafting changes to rules on clearing companies: The Financial Regulatory Authority’s (FRA) board of directors agreed last week to put forth proposed amendments to the law governing clearing and depository companies, according to a FRA statement (pdf). The proposed amendments include allowing companies to receive licenses from the FRA to provide clearing and depository services on futures contracts traded on a futures exchange, as well as paving the way for the Central Bank of Egypt (CBE) to set up a shareholding company to provide these services on government bonds and treasury bill issuances. The CBE, the Finance Ministry, and Misr for Central Clearing, Depository and Registry (MCDR) had said in April that they are also considering enacting changes to the rules on clearing companies.

When will we see this new shareholding company? Procedures to set up a new debt-focused central clearing and depository company are expected to be completed by the end of 3Q2019, government sources said. The Madbouly Cabinet’s economic group approved on Friday establishing the company to handle all the clearing and registry of government debt issuances, as well as collect taxes from these issuances. It will have capital of EGP 100 mn, 60% of which will be put up by the CBE, with the Finance Ministry and Misr for Central Clearing, Depository and Registry (MCDR) each contributing 20%.

CBE to cut rates by another 400 bps by end of 2020 -HC Securities: The Central Bank of Egypt will cut rates by 100 bps in 4Q2019 before making 300 bps worth of cuts in 2020, HC Securities & Investment writes in a report to clients. The return to easing will be a “catalyst” to stimulate private investment growth and boost economic growth to 5.9% in FY2019-2020 and 6.3% in FY2020-2021, the investment bank says.

Where is the EGP heading? HC says that the EGP remains “largely dependent” on foreign portfolio flows, and attributes the recent appreciation of the EGP against the greenback to carry trade inflows. The EGP/USD rate should stabilize over the next few months, before reversing course over the next two fiscal years, averaging EGP 17.43/USD in FY2019-2020 and EGP 18.25/USD in FY2020-2021.

Inflation: Average annual inflation will continue to decline over the coming years, finally reaching single digits in FY2021-2022 when it averages 8.4% over the 12 months, according to HC. The Finance Ministry, meanwhile, is currently projecting inflation to fall to single digit inflation (9.1%) a year earlier in FY2020-2021.

Foreign direct investment will rebound next year, rising to USD 7.8 bn in FY2019-2020 and USD 8.6 bn the year after, HC projects.

A two-day US-led workshop to “promote Palestinian economic development” begins tomorrow in Manama, Bahrain. An Egyptian delegation led by an as-yet-unnamed vice finance minister will attend the event, which is being held to discuss the Trump administration’s economic plan to restart the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.

Who else is attending? Officials from GCC states, Jordan and Morocco will be present. Notably, neither the Palestinian Authority nor Israel are sending delegations.

Regional reaction to the Trump-Kushner plan released on Saturday has been mixed to say the least: “Colossal waste of time,” “non-starter,” and “dead on arrival,” are just some of the phrases used across the Arab world to describe Kushner’s USD 50 bn Palestinian economic development plan, Reuters reports.

It received a more positive reception in the Gulf: Saudi FM Adel Jubeir welcomed the attempt to improve the regional economy while several figures in Gulf countries criticized the Palestinians for rejecting the proposal.

Egypt has so far stayed silent: Neither the government nor Al Azhar has officially opined on the plan, which would invest USD 9.1 bn in Egyptian transport, energy and water infrastructure projects.

Arab finance ministers agree USD 100 mn monthly support to PA: Arab finance ministers said that they were committed to giving the Palestinian Authority USD 100 mn each month in financial support at a meeting in Cairo yesterday, the state-run MENA agency reported (via Bloomberg). The Arab League agreed to the plan back in April but are yet to act on it. The ministers also appealed to Arab states and regional banks to offer loans for infrastructure and development projects in the West Bank and Gaza. The PA’s financial situation has deteriorated further since February when Israel reduced the amount of tax revenue it hands over each month by 5%.

Has Saudi Arabia’s inclusion among MSCI EMs actually hurt the index? The highly anticipated inclusion of Saudi stocks in the MSCI Emerging Markets Index has fueled a rally on the Tadawul, raising both inflows and valuations — but these have not been accompanied by a rise in earnings. On the contrary, the earnings outlook for Saudi companies appears to be deteriorating faster than its peers, according to Bloomberg. This has had the effect of lowering the earnings projections for the entire region. Analysts had projected that earnings for the region’s companies would rise 3.3% this year prior to Saudi’s inclusion. Since then, the projections have turned into a 1.9% drop. Forecasts for the kingdom are down 7.7% in USD terms, the news outlet says. This has also had the effect of making the MSCI EM Index pricier in terms of valuations, which could drive away investors.

The shorts are circling: Short sellers think the bull market for the Tadawul will fall in line with the negative earnings outlook, Bloomberg notes. “They have boosted bearish [positions] against the iShares MSCI Saudi Arabia ETF above 10% of outstanding shares for the first time since its inception,” the article reads.

Why didn’t Saudi’s inclusion meet expectations? The country’s fundamentals are worsening, JPMorgan Chase analysts Naresh Bilandani and Saanil A Jain say. The investment bank said the risk-reward equation for Saudi banking stocks looked unattractive, downgrading some of the country’s biggest lenders to underweight. The FT noted last week that private-sector companies in Saudi Arabia are griping at the negative impact of de facto Saudi ruler Mohamed bin Salman’s reforms.

Not helping matters is the continued pummeling of the country’s reputation, which took another hit last week when a UN expert said there was “credible evidence” that MbS was involved in the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, according to the FT. Agnes Callamard, the UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial executions, has called for a follow-up investigation.

The websites of all three state-owned dailies were down at dispatch time this morning. Check back here tomorrow for the front pages.

If the way to the heart is through the stomach… Three stories from the Kerning Cultures podcast (listen, runtime: 49:00) take the simple topic of baklava and use it to produce something funny and relatable. The history of Harissa al Halaby, one of the oldest pastry shops in Alexandria, may make you want to go immediately to Mahatet El Raml and stroll around with some baklava, or harissa made to a secret 110-year-old recipe, in your hand.

A few unusual facts about the delectable dessert: In Greece a decision was taken thousands of years ago to use 33 sheets of pastry to make baklava, because that was the age to which Jesus. While the Greece-Turkey baklava rivalry is legendary, many countries claim it as their own, including the US — where Texas has its own speciality baklava.

UK Trade Envoy Sir Jeffrey Donaldson has arrived in Cairo with representatives from two major British healthcare providers, Escalla and AT Medics, to explore ways to increase cooperation between the two countries in the health sector, the British Embassy in Cairo said. Donaldson is expected to meet with Finance Minister Mohamed Maait, Military Production Minister Mohamed Al Assar and Environment Minister Yasmin Fouad, as well as seven British companies working in Egypt’s healthcare sector, during his two-day visit to the Egyptian capital.

This follows the visit of a delegation of six British healthcare companies in April to meet with government officials on developing Egypt’s healthcare system. More than 30 Egyptian doctors have received training in the UK since Egypt and the UK signed an MoU in January to exchange expertise in the sector. The figure is expected to reach 100 before the end of the year, the embassy said.

Israel’s Communications Minister Ayoub Kara said he is withdrawing his candidacy to serve as ambassador to Egypt, following strong opposition from Israeli diplomats, the Times of Israel reports. Kara has little diplomatic experience, despite being PM Benjamin Netanyahu’s top pick for the job. Diplomats have reportedly been pushing for the appointment of Amira Oron, who was selected as Tel Aviv’s ambassador to Egypt in October last year.

Elsewedy Electrometer plans to spend USD 3 mn this year expanding its business in Brazil, Chairman & CEO Emad Elsewedy tells Zawya. The company manufactures electricity, gas and water products, including smart meters, which it currently exports to 46 countries around the world. Elsewedy says the Brazilian market has “huge” potential, which will increase thanks to the Egypt-Mercosur trade agreement, which has been in effect since September 2017.

Property developer Misr Italia has established a real estate fund with initial capital of EGP 100 mn, Chairman Hani El Assal told Al Shorouk. The company plans to invest EGP 2 bn this year and is in talks with the National Bank of Egypt over a EGP 500-700 mn loan for its Cairo Business Park project and another EGP 150 mn for a hotel within the project. Talks are currently centered on the loans’ interest rate, which Misr Italia is looking to reduce from 20-21%.

British travel company Thomas Cook’s summer bookings in Egypt are up 15% y-o-y, while winter 2019/2020 bookings have increased 57% y-o-y, the company’s chief of tour operating said in a press release. The company also confirmed that it will open two new hotels in El Gouna later this year. The Cook’s Club will open its doors in August and the Casa Cook will open in October. A subsidiary of Orascom Development Egypt in December announced that it would work with the travel company to develop the Casa Cook hotel and rebrand Arena Inn into the Cook’s Club.

Attijariwafa Bank has filed requests to the Central Bank of Egypt to acquire mobile banking and internet banking licenses, Chairman Halla Sakr tells Mubasher. The efforts to receive the licenses are part of the bank’s plan to expand its digital services.

Is the Arab world becoming less religious? The number of Arabs who describe themselves as non-religious has risen to 13% from 8% since 2013, according to research by BBC News Arabic. Working with the Arab Barometer, the broadcaster surveyed 25k people in the Arab region for their opinions on politics, social issues and religion. And what did they find?

• Tunisia is the least religious Arab country
• Most people are okay with the idea of a female prime minister
• Putin gets more love than Trump
• Israel is still enemy #1
• Half of Sudanese people surveyed were thinking of emigrating.