Health Ministry is strangling investment in pharma industry, government regulator says

Random observation on our second slow news morning in a row: In many ways, Bloomberg’s Ahmed Feteha captures the zeitgeist of the week with “Busy bankruptcy lawyers put Egypt economic overhaul on notice.” And yet in just about every meeting or call we’ve had with a business owner or big company CEO in the past month, the discussion has inevitably broken down as:

Us: “So, how’s business?”

Owner / CEO: “It’s crazy. The pound. Inflation. Gotta upsize / downsize / rightsize my products / services. Maybe cut back on spending. It’s hard to figure out where to price the USD in our budget for next year. What are the others telling you? They’ve got the same problems, right?”

Us: “Well, you’d be surprised at how optimistic folks are, in the main. So sales are suffering?”

Owner / CEO: “No, not really. Definitely not as much as I expected. And, I mean, Black Friday? Wow. But how much more can the market really take?”

Us: “So you’re cutting back on investment next year?”

Owner / CEO: “Cutting back on investment? No. Of course not. I’m investing as much or more. We’ve got some turbulence ahead of us — and policy developments like the impounding of sugar / lack of VAT regulations / grumbling about new taxes are really unsettling — but I’m very confident in my business and my industry. And I think I feel better about prospects for the economy at large than I have in years.”

We’re not going to rely on anecdotal evidence, though: Look on Sunday for the launch of our first Enterprise Business Confidence Gauge. We took your reaction to (and suggestions about) our first-ever reader survey to heart, and we’re making it a quarterly thing. The survey will run every day next week and results will appear in our year-in-review package during the week of 25 December.

GAFI will present the latest draft of the new Investment Law to business associations today for a review prior to sending to the Ismail cabinet on 14 December for sign-off.

Citi’s 2016 Global Healthcare Conference runs today and tomorrow in London.

The RiseUp Summit takes place at Ahmed El Alfi’s wonderful Greek Campus. Check out the entrepreneurism summit’s website, which features an updated agenda and a full list of very interesting speakers.

The KarmSolar Annual Forum, a RiseUp satellite event, is slated to take place on Thursday at Al Falaki Theater, Downtown Cairo. Registration information for the KarmSolar event: annual.forum@karmsolar.com.

REMINDER: Sunday, 11 December is a day off for the EGX and (we presume) for the nation at large (thought Cabinet has yet to weigh in on the matter). With the bourse and many schools closed, Enterprise will be taking the day off. We’ll be back on Monday, 12 December.

Talkshows last night focused on the bust of what prosecutors allege was an international organ trafficking ring in Egypt. Health Minister Ahmed Rady ordered yesterday the shuttering of hospitals alleged to have been involved in the ring, according to Reuters. The Administrative Control Authority (ACA) arrested or issued warrants for 45 individuals who were allegedly behind it, including doctors, nurses and university professors, among others, from Egypt and abroad. Rady claimed that all the suspected illegal organ transplant procedures connected to the ring took place in private or unlicensed hospitals, saying no case had yet been uncovered in a Health Ministry hospital.

Yahduth fi Masr’s Sherif Amer reported that the ACA have been investigating trafficking human organs for several months in cooperation with the Health Ministry in the medical side.

Amr Adib was very impressed with the ACA during last night’s episode of Kol Youm, saying, “This is like an international operation… the ACA kept doing their work silently then half of their staff were on the streets last night to arrest the defendants” (watch, runtime: 5:14).

Head of the Armed Forces’ Engineering Authority Kamel El Wazir called in again last night to say that he had visited the disastrous Aswan train station on Tuesday, following the announcement that the armed forces were stepping in during the previous night. promise last night to fix the station. “The station is in worse shape than what has been reported,” he said. El Wazir added they are considering developing Luxor train station as well. Adib, doe-eyed with admiration, said. ‘I imagined it would take a week to move” (watch, runtime: 7:11).

Adib showcased a report on the launch of the “Support Local Tourism” initiative (watch, runtime: 3:42) and proudly celebrated ONTV’s Youtube channel surpassing 1 mn subscribers (watch, runtime: 8:30).

Lamees Al Hadidy focused on the negative implications of arresting a manager of Heinz’ factory in Sixth of October for allegedly using rotten tomatoes. “What is the message we are sending to foreign investors here?” Lamees asked. “Similar incidents happened with Edita and businessman Salah Diab, where allegations were not proven,” she said. Heinz legal counsel Mohamed Hammouda agreed with Lamees. Ashraf El Gazayerli, head of the Federation of Egyptian Industries’ food industries division, proposed that names of companies be withheld until the results of a full investigation are revealed. “This incident can harm Heinz exports from Egypt to the African and Arab markets,” El Gazayerli said (watch, runtime: 59:35).

Al Qahera Wel Nas’ Ibrahim Eissa talked about Russia and China’s moves to quash a UN Security Council resolution on a ceasefire in Syria drafted by Egypt, New Zealand and Spain. Eissa said that this at least shows that Egypt is taking the initiative on key regional issues and not just being a passive power. More significantly, Eissa noted that this means Egypt now no longer takes it cues from Saudi Arabia on the Syrian conflict (watch, runtime: 36:08).

So long, roz. Hello, steamed rice: The Central Bank of Egypt announced it has signed an agreement with the People’s Bank of China, entering into a bilateral currency swap for a total amount of CNY 18 bn (equivalent to around USD 2.62 bn) against the equivalent in EGP. The agreement is valid for three years, with an option to extend by mutual consent. The CBE says the agreement demonstrates “the strong international support” Egypt received “to its homegrown reform program. Additionally, it complements a series of measures taken which aim to unleash the vast potential of the Egyptian economy and instill confidence by bolstering economic activity.” A government official also reportedly told Al Borsa that the CBE is considering negotiating another loan swap with one of the G7 countries “to decrease the demand for the USD.”

…Separately, a source at the CBE confirmed to Al Masry Al Youm that CBE reserves are on track to reach USD 25 bn by year-end and denied there would be changes in the composition of its board of directors. CI Capital’s Hany Farahat agrees, telling Bloomberg that hitting the USD 25 bn target by the end of the month is now “very likely” and that the “larger reserves mean stronger firepower on part of the central bank, which should boost confidence in the pound and support the flotation process.”

The Health Ministry is restricting investment in the pharmaceuticals sector through its policies, the Egyptian Competition Authority (ECA), says. The Ministry’s “box” policy, which restricts the number of similar medications that could be produced in the market to just 12, including the original product and one import, restricts competition and hampers new investment, ECA adds. The pricing scheme, which is based on when producers file for the pricing request also, according to the ECA, violates fair market competition. The ECA’s chief, Mona El Garf, says her authority will continue to cooperate with the Health Ministry to improve the pharma market and attract new investments and aims to expand this type of cooperation to all sectors that “affect citizens” directly. (The link to the ECA’s announcement remained broken at press time, so we’re including a screenshot of the piece for those looking for the original.)

… in related news, the first batch of the medications imported by the government is set to arrive “within days,” CEO of the state-owned Egyptian Pharmaceutical Trading Company told Al Mal. The first batch includes blood derivatives, he says.

Kuwait would like to “help clear the air” between Egypt and Saudi and potentially mediate a reconciliation, according to Kuwait’s Undersecretary of Foreign Affairs Khaled al-Jarallah, Al Shorouk reported. Last month, we had noted reports that Kuwait and the UAE were attempting to mediate to fix the rift between Cairo and Riyadh. Al-Jarallah’s statement is the most senior government acknowledgment from the GCC — or Egypt, for that matter — of the existence of a rift, let alone of a genuine effort to mediate.

Meanwhile: TheKuwaiti European Holding Group is studying investing USD 1 bn into a multi-purpose city, General Authority for Free Zones and Investments CEO Mohamed Khodeir told Al Mal. The development would include houses, entertainment facilities, commercial use developments, and administrative projects, he added.

Centamin isn’t investing more in Egypt, says terms of upcoming gold tender are “unfair”: Centamin is reportedly not participating in a gold exploration tender that will be issued by the Oil Ministry, Centamin Egypt CEO Josef El Garhy told Al Mal. The tender, which is set to be the Ministry’s first since 2009, comes with “unfair terms,” Centamin claims. El Raghy also said the company has stopped new investments in Egypt and has instead reallocated funds to its operations in Ethiopia, Côte d’Ivoire, and Burkina Faso. As we had previously reported, Centamin completed recovering over USD 1 bn of its capital costs on the Sukari gold mine and entered into the profit sharing phase of its agreement with the Egyptian government as of October 2016.

Raya Holding has signed an agreement in principle to acquire 100% of International Union for Integrated Food Industries for EGP 80 mn, Raya said in a regulatory filing picked up by Reuters. The final valuation will be determined after completing due diligence.

Solid Capital, a newcomer on the local financial scene, is reportedly leading a consortium of Arab of foreign investors to acquire a 15% in CI Capital, with Solid Capital looking to take an 8% stake itself, sources tell Al Mal. The offer would be at the same valuation at which CIB sold 71.94% of the nation’s second-largest investment bank last week to a number of investors, making the bid worth close to EGP 142.5 mn. Al Mal says Solid Capital is a subsidiary of Netherlands-based Solid Capital Partners BV, a claim we cannot substantiate. We could find no entity by that name on a fast search this morning. There is what appears to be an unrelated Dutch VC outfit by the name Solid Ventures, but the website referenced on Solid Capital Partners’ LinkedIn profile is defunct.

OPEC’s agreement to cap production is already having an effect on Suez Canal tolls, with the Suez Canal Authority (SCA) set to hand down new transit fees once oil prices have stabilized, said SCA chief Mohab Mamish. As we noted yesterday, there is already talk about how the agreement is looking good for Suez Canal revenues as the price of traveling around the Cape of Good Hope rises. Furthermore, the Suez Canal has had to slash transit fees throughout the year as cheaper fuel prices made the route less desirable. On a related note, shipping lines are still in talks with SCA on paying transit fees in advance in exchange for discounts; the lines are pushing for a 6% discount, Al Mal cites Mamish as having said. The authority is offering a 3% for the prepayment of three years’ transit fees and a 5% discount for a five-year prepayment, the highest rate authorized by the CBE. A decision from the three majors — Maersk, MCS, and CMA — was expected last month.

Gov’t cuts early retirement target for civil servants by a bit over half: The government appears to cut its early retirement target to 1 mn over the next five years from an originally stated 2 mn by 2020, said Planning Minister Ashraf Al Araby (you dashed our hopes quite expertly, sir). Still, the mere notion that someone of cabinet rank is still discussing downsizing carries a measure of significance. Al Araby added that the Civil Service Act had provided incentives for employees wishing to retire early, Al Shorouk reports. He added that the government plans to draft a new law on pensions, but did not elaborate, according to the newspaper. As welfare frauds are now known at Enterprise as Kramers, rank-and-file civil servants of the type one would want to see availing themselves of the early retirement program shall henceforth be dubbed “Costanzas.”

FiT phase two is funded: 30 local and international banks have reportedly committed up to USD 3 bn in funding to phase two of the feed-in tariff (FiT) program, according to Al Borsa. State officials said that funding institutions and investors are expressing renewed interest in the FiT’s phase two after clause making Paris the seat of appealing international arbitration rulings in Cairo were instituted. Investors will be required to complete new feasibility studies to tap funding provided by institutions including African Development Bank, the International Finance Corporation, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, the European Investment Bank, the Export-Import Bank of China, KfW, BNP Paribas, and HSBC. Energy companies with signed contracts already in negotiations with lenders and expected to present their funding agreements by April.

In the meantime (and stripped of the requisite vitriol): Some solar companies are demanding their industry get the same tax and customs breaks that Siemens is receiving for its work on the three combined-cycle power plants, reports Al Mal. These incentives should have been granted to smaller local companies to stimulate the local industry, said Cairo Solar chairman Hisham Tawfik, who has come out as the most vocal detractor of the FiT program since backing out. Siemens officials tell the newspaper that the tax and customs breaks are part of the contract. They added that Siemens has given Egypt discounted prices and that these benefits will be extended to companies subcontracted by Siemens.

But it’s not all bad news for FiT, the Electricity Ministry will not chase the companies to pay 30% more on their cost-sharing agreements, Al Borsa reports. It will, however, not change the tariff. Rumors have swirled until now that the state would look to reprice after the float of the EGP the 30% of FiT infrastructure companies are required to pay.

In related news: Planning Minister Ashraf Al Araby confirmed that the government has set up two committees to look into reimbursing contractors and suppliers that delivered goods and services to the government using prices that were set prior to the EGP float. The committees are set to reach a resolution in January, Al Shorouk says.

The least expensive bimmer in Egypt now will knock you back over half a mil: The 2017 BMW price list is out and Al Mal have published a copy. The cheapest of the lot: the 1499cc 118i LCI sells for EGP 525,000, while the new 2,998cc 740Li comes in at a jaw-dropping EGP 3.75 mn.

Gold bugs, take heart: Today’s low price could guarantee “a supply shortage by the end of the decade,” the Financial Times (paywall) writes. “Bullion’s only modest price recovery this year compared with other commodities has led the industry to cut spending on exploration dramatically … [a] supply shortage will be inevitable unless some major discoveries of large, high-grade ore bodies are suddenly made. ‘Which frankly seems a remote possibility.’” The piece notes that major players have been tepid on M&A, focusing instead on efficiencies at existing asset as well as “free-cash flow generation and dividends.” Fresh debt is in short supply, the paper says, and capital spending “has fallen to less than half its USD 25 bn peak in 2012.” Oh, and mine production? It has plateaued.

With production “falling off a cliff in a few years” (as one industry veteran put it, “analysts at BMO Capital markets predicting a peak of gold supply in 2019,” make it likely that acquisitions “may not be the focus now, but will be required longer-term.”

Bonus: Egypt’s Centamin gets a shout-out as the piece notes that part of the focus going forward will be on new territories such as Egypt and Iran.

Elsewhere, the dream of a natural gas market the functions like the one for oil just won’t die, with the Wall Street Journal (paywall) reporting that “Two U.S. exchanges plan to launch derivatives that could make it easier to trade a type of natural gas, potentially revolutionizing this market in the way that the Brent and West Texas Intermediate benchmarks did for crude oil.” With more and more natural gas moving around the world by ship instead of pipeline, there’s now an embryonic spot market, making it “easier to launch futures contracts, which will attract a wider pool of investors while offering the sort of real-time prices currently available in oil, gold and many other major commodities. Companies and investors use commodities-futures markets to speculate on the price of a commodity and to hedge its risk against turns in the market. … Currently, buyers and sellers mainly agree to yearslong LNG contracts priced off oil, gas that is piped, and price reporting agencies’ data. There is no global price benchmark for LNG.”

The next few days will be all about Egypt’s role in sending illegal migrants to Europe after a trio of stories led by Reuters and BBC Newsnight together prompted “the head of Europe’s police agency [Europol] to say it would ‘look again’ at the largest migrant shipwreck in the Mediterranean this year after an investigation by Reuters and BBC Newsnight exposed a gap in the response by law enforcement.”

More than 500 people drowned off the coast of Egypt in April in a failed bid to reach Europe, with “an estimated 190 Somalis, around 150 Ethiopians, 80 Egyptians, and some 85 people from Sudan, Syria and other countries” among the dead. We note this is a tragedy entirely separate from the September migrant boat disaster that killed more than 200.

In two separate stories, Stephen Grey and Amina Ismail delve into the migrant smuggling business in Egypt, detailing how the smuggling route works and digging into the April shipwreck. A follow-up piece quotes the director of Europol as saying the agency “would reconsider the shipwreck.” Meanwhile, BBC’s Newsnight notes that Europol is considering reopening the investigation, as Egypt “has never publicly acknowledged the sinking” and Greece’s coastguard “did not refer the case to a criminal prosecutor” due to its taking place outside Greek territory.

Reuters also looks at the struggle of the Oromos to win asylum in Egypt. The Oromos, an Ethiopian ethnic group, have been fleeing their homeland as a result of a government crackdown and seeking refuge in Egypt, where they say they continue to face discrimination at the hands of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees. Some use Egypt as a “jumping board” to reach Europe’s shores illegally.

Other coverage of Egypt in the Western press this morning:

• At least 25 arrested as cops break up organ trafficking ring: “Egyptian authorities have arrested doctors, nurses and professors suspected of being involved in an international organ trafficking ring,” reports the BBC. It’s going to do wonders for our bid to promote medical tourism…
• You know it must be a slow day in the UK when the video purporting to show less-than-appetizing conditions at a Heinz plant in Egypt makes the Daily Mail. (Background here.)
• Three gunmen killed in raid: Per Reuters: “Egyptian security forces killed three gunmen on Tuesday, the interior ministry said, in a raid on a hideout used by what it described as an armed wing of the Muslim Brotherhood.” The raid on a cell of the “Hasm” offshoot of the Ikhwan took place in Assiut.
• Protest law and WaPo: Amr Hamzawy and Nathan J. Brown penned a piece for the Washington Post dissecting the Supreme Constitutional Court’s recent decision to strike down a portion of the contentious protest law.
• Pet cemetery: No, not the Stephen King novel. The Smithsonian tells us that Archaeologists have discovered a “nearly 2,000-year-old pet cemetery in Egypt” that contains “100 lovingly positioned creatures … [suggesting] that the ancients could have valued their companion animals as much as we do.

It’s not like the Egyptian press could lift a finger to save itself: Nageh Ibrahim drones on about many things in his latest column on El Watan, but nothing so much as the ‘dire’ state of the domestic press. The problem? As so is so often the case: Zero sense of agency. The press isn’t in a shambles because it’s an industry in transition, and it’s not like journalists can do anything about anything, to hear Ibrahim tell it. Instead, he urges “the loyal people of this country to save [the press], because it is the backbone of culture and intellect… it has to return to its former glory.” Helpful, no?

Fast-fashion takes on a new meaning when a coat can go from sketch board to in-stores in 25 days. The Wall Street Journal (paywall) traces in words (here) and in a photo essay (here) how the fast-fashion geniuses at Zara turned an idea in Spain into a potential global hit in less than a month — all with brilliant efficiency. Follow that up with a visit to the corporate website of Inditex, which owns the Zara brand (along with Massimo Dutti, Pull & Bear and other names that should be instantly recognizable to anyone who’s ever stepped foot in an Egyptian mall).

And if you’re a geek for the business of fashion: Check out Inditex’s corporate video. It’s long at 43:16, but worth it if you consider BoF your ideal morning read.

Prosecutor general leads “Regeni delegation” to Rome: Prosecutor General Nabil Sadek is heading a delegation to Rome today to present Italian authorities with the latest findings in Egypt’s investigation into the murder in Cairo earlier this year of Italian graduate student Giulio Regeni, AMAY reported. Italian investigators had extended a formal invitation to the Prosecutor and his team early last November to exchange information and documents and follow up on the case.

Italy’s ANSA news agency sets the political tone for the meeting, noting that Regeni’s parents have received “hazy” responses from politicians (presumably Italian) and expect little of Egypt: “‘By now we are used to interpreting every piece of news as a possible cover-up,’ they said, voicing the fear that ‘they may be cooking up another great mise en scene, with ‘well-qualified’ scapegoats.’”

El Sisi meets with water and irrigation ministers from five Nile Basin countries: President Abdel Fattah El Sisi met with water and irrigation ministers from the Nile basin countries of Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda, South Sudan, and Burundi, Al Masry Al Youm reported. The meeting discussed developing technology to reach better sustainable management of water.

Foreign Affairs Minister Sameh Shoukry met with the US House Committee on Armed Services Chair Mac Thornberry to discuss military aid to Egypt, the ministry said in a statement. Thornberry assured that the new US administration will give a new push to Egyptian-American relations. Additionally, Shoukry met with the US Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs Chair Bob Corker to discuss regional stability, Egypt’s new NGO law, and balancing security and personal freedoms, the ministry said in a separate statement.

Agreements with Slovenia: Egypt’s El Sewedy Cables, HoldiPharma, and Solera signed cooperation agreements with Slovenian counterparties in the cables, pharma, and renewable energy industries, respectively, Al Mal reports. The agreements were inked during a two-day visit to Cairo by Slovenian President Borut Pahor.

UNDP inked an MoU with the Industrial Modernization Center worth USD 3.5 mn for a “photovoltaic systems” project, according to a statement from the International Cooperation Ministry

EGPC is set to sign a USD 200 mn loan agreement with a banking consortium that includes the African Export Import Bank (Afreximbank) and NBE to finance operations and petroleum product imports, sources told Al Mal. The agreement will be signed within a week, unnamed sources said.

Rosatom State Nuclear Energy Corporation’s CEO Alexei Likhachev reiterated to reporters yesterday the Daba’a agreement will be signed with Egypt by the end of the month. Likhachev specified that the agreement “concerned a full package of documents and accompanying agreements, including those regarding the supply of nuclear fuel for reactors and its eventual disposal.”

Eni plans to complete phase one of its USD 4 bn gas processing plant in Port Said next October, Al Borsa reported. The first phase of the plant, which will process gas from Zohr, will produce a daily 650 mcf, which represents 24% of the facility’s total daily capacity upon becoming fully operational of 2.7 bcf. The project should operate at full capacity by 2020 and Eni expects to pump a daily 900 mcf into Egypt’s natural gas network by the end of 2017 or 1Q2018, sources at Eni told the newspaper.

Chinese telecom company Huawei is planning on establishing a fiber optics cable factory in an unspecified technological zone in Egypt, Al Mal reports. The size of the factory, the investment associated with it, and its output level have not been set yet, according to an unnamed source from the Information Technology Industry Development Agency.

The Housing Ministry plans to sell 3-4,000 plots of land as part of the next phase of Beit El Watan (Egyptian expats buying real estate from the government in USD) in 1Q17. The government reportedly made a whopping USD 900 mn in the last Beit El Watan sale, Al Borsa reports.

Charter airlines that can bring regular streams of tourists into eight of Egypt’s airports from at least three out of 12 European countries set by the state will be exempt from tourist carrier fees from mid-December and until 30 October next year, Civil Aviation Minister Sherif Fathy said, according to Al Mal. The move is part of the ministry’s initiative to boost tourist activity in Egypt.

A Japanese tourist was killed and three others were injured in a bus accident on the Aswan-Abu Simbel road in Upper Egypt on Tuesday, Al Mal reported. The injured – another Japanese tourist, the tour guide, and the bus driver – were transferred to Abu Simbel Tourist Hospital for treatment.

The House of Representatives’ Media Committee has finished reviewing the new Media Act and has put it on the agenda for the full House for discussion next week prior to a vote, AMAY reported. The act, among other things, entails the establishment of a Supreme Media Council with vast oversight authorities over the industry.

Egypt has borrowed USD 24 bn in development loans over the past year and a half, said International Cooperation Minister Sahar Nasr. In an interview with Al Ahram, Nasr stressed that Egypt’s burrowing for development projects was not excessive and that these loans only make up 6% of public debt and 35% of all external debt. 49% of these loans went into electricity projects. This comes as Nasr attended the signing of a USD 3.5 mn grant from the UN to fund developing a solar panel factory yesterday, Al Shorouk reports. Saudi funding for Sinai projects remains on track, said Nasr in response to questions over whether the rift with Saudi Arabia had impacted funding.

Air and naval forces of Egypt and Greece are set to begin a five-day military and aeronautical exercise called Medusa 2016 from Thursday, International Business Times reported. The joint drills are scheduled to take place until 12 December and will see activities including: “operating day and night sailing formations, maritime interdiction operation, and planning and administering joint naval operations. It will also have training on communications exchange between units, naval vessels, offshore units and personnel to perform various drills at sea. In the drills, the air and naval forces of both countries will be trained to secure offshore units using air-defense weapons; protect lines of communication and the movement of maritime transport.”

CNN just can’t get enough of Egypt’s movie scene: After last week’s feature on the rise of independent cinema in Egypt, CNN explored the industry as a whole and concluded that Egypt’s cinema is plotting a comeback, Kieron Monks writes for CNN. After years of instability following 2011, Monks writes, “there are signs that the Egyptian movie powerhouse is coming back to life.” While funding for films and the number of produced features are increasing, productions are still being restricted by demands for “popcorn” movies on one side and censorship on the other. This makes one movie critic “optimistic that a generation of internet amateurs, who can bypass the censors and the studios, will reshape the landscape.” Monks says “Egypt’s next revolution may be underway.”

The world’s heaviest woman, reportedly an Alexandria native, caught the attention of India’s External Affairs Minister when her doctor sent the minister a plea via Twitter asking him to help Iman Abdulati obtain a medical visa to India, according to The Times of India. The 36-year-old, who is said to weigh around 500 kg, suffers from kidney failure and is seeking treatment in India.