NBE dishes out EGP 27 bn of loans to factories under CBE’s local industry initiative: The National Bank of Egypt (NBE) has provided EGP 27.1 bn in loans to medium-sized factories under the Central Bank of Egypt’s EGP 100 bn initiative to boost domestic manufacturing, NBE head of corporate and syndication Sherif Riad tells Al Mal. The initiative, which was launched in December, allows companies to access subsidized loans at a declining 10% interest rate. The funding pool was originally geared towards medium-sized factories with annual sales revenues between EGP 50k and 1 bn, but was expanded earlier this month to include companies of all sizes.