Egypt’s choice vaccine is 90% effective + a possible end to the IPO drought

Good morning, wonderful people — and happy midweek. We have a pleasantly busy issue this morning, including two international stories with big implications for Egypt to start the day.

FIRST- From the Department of Awesome News — AstraZeneca’s shot can be up to 90% effective depending on the regimen used, the company said yesterday. The final clinical results showed 62% efficacy when administered in a single dose and 90% when patients take a half dose followed by a full dose one month later. This means that the vaccine is on average 70% effective, the company said, adding that it should be ready to supply hundreds of mns of doses after getting regulatory approval. Further clinical trials are ongoing in the US, Japan, Russia, South Africa, Kenya and Latin America. Reuters, Bloomberg, the Financial Times, and others had the story.

Chart of the day: Despite delivering efficacy rates below Pfizer and Moderna at c. 94-95%, Astrazeneca is proving the most popular vaccine candidate. Even in developed countries that are more able to transport the Pfizer/Moderna mrna vaccines, Astrazeneca has orders for hundreds of mns more doses than its competitors, as this Bloomberg graphic shows.

Egypt has placed an order with AstraZeneca to cover about 30% of the population and plans to get enough to cover at least 20% of us with Pfizer’s vaccine, Health Minister Hala Zayed said last week.

Why it matters: Critically, the AstraZeneca vaccine — also called the “Oxford” vaccine as it was developed in partnership with scientists from the university — can be stored at 2-8°C, roughly the same temperature as your refrigerator at home. The slightly more efficient Pfizer and Moderna shots need to be stored at -70°C until just before use.

SECOND- It looks like Agent Orange has finally thrown in the towel after his administration said overnight it would allow President-elect Joe Biden to begin his transition. That means Biden will start to receive the presidential daily briefing from the intelligence community and that his team will have access to office space in government, be able to get security clearances for its people, and begin holding briefings with current office holders and career civil servants. Writing on Twitter that although he will “keep up the good fight,” The Donald announced that he would allow the agency tasked with overseeing transitions to get to work.

The story is front-page news globally, from Reuters to the New York Times and the FT.

The first ever female Fed chair may become the first female US treasury secretary: President-elect Joe Biden appears set to nominate former Federal Reserve chair Janet Yellen as his treasury secretary, US media reported yesterday. A veteran central banker, Yellen was appointed Fed vice chair by the Obama administration in 2010 before entering the hot seat from 2014-2018. In maybe her toughest job yet, Yellen would helm the treasury with an economy still struggling from the blow of the pandemic, and a divided Congress still nowhere near agreeing on a vital stimulus package. The story dominates the global business press from Reuters to the Wall Street Journal.

PSA #1- Batten down the hatches — more rain could be on the way. Prime Minister Moustafa Madbouly called governorates to prepare for more severe weather over the coming days, a cabinet statement said. The Egyptian Meteorological Authority is currently forecasting moderate rain in Cairo and along the north coast tomorrow and Thursday. Our favourite weather app agrees, showing a good chance of rain Wednesday and Thursday and then again next Monday. Youm7 has more.

PSA #2- We’re taking a publication holiday on Thursday: Enterprise will be off as we put the final touches on something new. We’ll be back in your inboxes at our customary 6am CLT on Sunday.

WATCH THIS SPACE- Just a little over half of the EGX30’s constituents are currently in compliance with regulations requiring at least one seat of their board of directors be occupied by a woman. Of the benchmark index’s 30 current constituents, 12 have all-male boards, including Credit Agricole Egypt, Egypt Kuwait Holding, Egyptian Iron & Steel, Elsewedy Electric, Emaar Misr, Ezz Steel, Palm Hills Developments, Pioneers Holding, Orascom Investment Holding, Sidi Kerir Petrochemicals, Sodic, and TMG Holding.

SMART POLICY #1- Listed companies are required to have at least one woman sitting on their board by the end of 2020, under regulations the Financial Regulatory Authority issued last year. The FRA recently floated a trial balloon about the notion of bumping that figure to 25%.

SMART POLICY #2- The Central Bank of Egypt will allow the boards of commercial banks to continue meeting virtually until December 2021, according to Hapi Journal. The CBE issued directives in March to allow for more meetings by conference call or video — including meetings by bank boards of directors.

The (virtual) Canada-Arab Business Forum runs today and tomorrow, making the case for more trade and investment between Canada and the Arab world. Ministers and industry experts will be talking, and you can sign up here.

Polling stations in 14 governorates will close at 9pm tonight in the first round of House runoff elections. Voters in Giza, Fayoum, Beni Suef, Minya, Assiut, New Valley, Sohag, Qena, Luxor, Aswan, Red Sea, Alexandria, Beheira, Matrouh can all cast their ballots today.

Also coming up: The latest edition of the Cairo Art Fair, hosted by our friends at TAM Gallery. The fair, which will feature some 1,500 works of art from 140 artists, kicks off on Saturday, 4 December and runs until 31 January 2021.

The Cairo International Book Fair has been postponed to June of next year due to the pandemic, a cabinet statement said on Monday.

The Health Ministry reported 354 new covid-19 infections yesterday, up from 351 the day before. Egypt has now disclosed a total of 113,381 confirmed cases of covid-19. The ministry also reported 12 new deaths, bringing the country’s total death toll to 6,560.

The purchasing needs of state hospitals and health facilities will be determined during ad-hoc meetings currently being held by the Unified Medical Procurement Authority through mid-December, the local press reports. The Madbouly government earlier this week said the health system is not facing a shortage of medical supplies.

Bringing you the latest in delicious dining options for you and your family to enjoy, Somabay has proudly expanded its F&B outlets and welcomes aboard our latest additions. Say hello to the Burger Factory and Baladina, now open at the Marina for mouthwatering meals.

Goldman joins the chorus singing the potential of EM equities: Emerging markets will have their star moment in 2Q2021, outperforming stocks elsewhere as a global economic rebound takes hold off the back of a successful vaccine, Goldman Sachs analysts wrote in a note, according to Bloomberg. RenCap also threw their chips behind EMs, saying the Biden presidency will increase FDI inflows to emerging and frontier markets.

Is Israel cozying up to Saudi? Saudi’s foreign ministry has denied that Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in a statement on Monday. Reuters.had reported that MBS met with Bibi and US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, citing the Israeli press. Israeli Education Minister Yoav Galant confirmed the meeting in a radio interview Monday afternoon, the NYT reported, though Netanyahu’s office made no comment. Saudi Arabia has not formally normalized ties with Israel, though it supports the possibility of normalization following a comprehensive Palestinian peace agreement.

The UAE is for the first time allowing domestic companies to be wholly owned by foreign investors after abolishing a law that required companies to have Emirati shareholders, Bloomberg reports.

The pandemic hasn’t done the gender employment and pay gap any favors, with job cuts in service industries that mainly employ women, and job creation now focused in male-dominated industries like tech, the Financial Times reports. FT analysis of official data found that 880k jobs were created in tech across five industry leaders this year but the new jobs were more widely filled by men than women, said Trudy Norris-Grey, who chairs a UK campaign for greater diversity in tech and urged companies to push for greater gender balance in the industry. Across the 34 OECD countries women were also more likely to be in temporary and low paying jobs than men.

Construction ban lifted: The government has decided against renewing its six-month construction ban but will not allow companies to resume construction until new requirements are issued in the first week of December, cabinet spokesperson Nader Saad told Kelma Akhira’s Lamees El Hadidi last night. There will then be a six-month period in which the government will automate the system of issuing building permits to eliminate previous loopholes (watch, runtime: 16:05).

Gold in Egypt: Oil Minister Tarek El Molla dropped into Kelma Akhira to talk gold, reviewing the recent results from the ministry’s gold exploration tender in the Eastern Desert. When asked about whether Naguib Sawiris has pulled out of talks to acquire the state-owned Shalateen Mining Company, El Molla suggested that negotiations might resume after the pandemic is finally over (watch, runtime: 15:20).

The message to Sudan on GERD: Get back to the negotiating table. Former irrigation minister Mohamed Nasr Allam told Ala Mas'ouleety's Ahmed Moussa that Sudan's decision to boycott the GERD talks serves Ethiopian's interests. Sudan last week said it would not participate in upcoming talks unless the African Union takes a bigger role mediating the dispute, calling them “useless” in their current format. Allam struck the opposite tone, calling the African Union an “inefficient” mediator and said that Egypt likely will return to the UN Security Council if it doesn’t start producing results (watch, runtime: 59:01).

House run-off elections: Al Hayah Al Youm’s Lobna Assal covered the opening day of the first runoff vote in the House elections, which she said saw a decline in voter turnout (watch, run time: 13:05). Masaa DMC’s Eman El Hosary and Ala Mas’ouleety’s Ahmed Moussa had the same coverage (watch, runtime: 6:57), (watch, runtime: 6:31).

IPO WATCH- CI Capital is planning to list up to 40% of its education management arm Taaleem Consulting and Educational Services in an IPO in 1Q2021, Al Mal reports, citing sources with knowledge of the matter. The investment bank has already hired legal advisors for the listing and (very rightly) believes the market is ready for a new offering, the sources said. There was no mention of how much the IPO will be looking to raise. Taaleem reported a net profit of EGP 150 mn in its fiscal year that ended in August and expects this figure to grow by 40% next fiscal year, CEO Hazem Badran previously told the newspaper.

The listing could see Taaleem issue new shares, Badran said last year, and CI Capital did not plan to exit the company anytime soon, but hoped to give some shareholders the option to do so if the needed liquidity, Badran said at the time.

The Taaleem news is exciting, coming as it does just days after Banque du Caire signalled it was too soon to think about the timing of its long-awaited IPO. BdC was supposed to list 20-30% of its shares in April but put its plans on hold as the pandemic shook global markets. This year’s window was at least the second time BdC put the brakes on the transaction.

CI is right that the market is hungry for new names, and Taaleem seems to be a well-run business, so it’s going to boil down to a snap call on market sentiment as D-Day approaches for the offering. And 1Q could be good: Goldman likes how emerging markets smell in 2021 (as we noted above in What We’re Tracking Today). And both RenCap and Credit Suisse have said this week that the EGX is in line to have a good year in ‘21. Adding some shine: Egypt’s strong fundamentals and the fact that we’re trading at a big discount after underperforming regional markets (we’re down 22% YTD as of yesterday’s close).

Background: CI Capital and a group of co-investors — which included StonePine ACE Fund, a JV between StonePine Capital and ACE — acquired a 60% stake in Taaleem from Thebes Education Management Holdings in an EGP 1.2 bn transaction in 2019. Taaleem owns Nahda University in Beni Suef, the largest private university in Upper Egypt.

A national strategy for financial inclusion is in the works at the Central Bank of Egypt (CBE), Governor Tarek Amer said during the Cairo ICT expo, according to Al Mal. The central bank and state statistics agency Capmas are working with an international financial inclusion expert on a study to identify gaps in the financial services market, Amer said, without providing further details.

It’s not clear how this will differ from the strategy unveiled by the CBE in 2019, which centers on strengthening its regulatory and supervisory role in the banking sector through legislative amendments such as the Banking Act, raising awareness on financial inclusion, enhancing the business environment through SME support, and promoting the use of fintech.

In other financial inclusion plans: The CBE plans to issue 20 mn Meeza cards, Amer said, without specifying a timeline for the rollout. Five mn of the cards will be dedicated to salary payments, 6.5 mn to pensions, 5 mn for people with disabilities, and 3.5 mn as part of the Takaful and Karama welfare programs. The Finance Ministry said last month it plans to roll out 5 mn Meeza salary cards by June 2021.

Egypt has been pushing financial inclusion for the last several years: The National Payments Council had passed a number of resolutions in 2017 setting up frameworks for mobile payments in the country and curbing cash transactions within the government, resulting in the 2018 Accounting Act which legally enshrined the transition towards a cashless economy. The E-payments Act issued last year obliging government and private sector entities to pay subsidiaries and suppliers electronically also constituted a significant push towards the government’s aim of going cashless.

EFG Hermes concluded a seven-year USD 265 mn debt arrangement for Orascom Development Egypt (ODE), the investment bank said in a press release (pdf) yesterday. ODE will use USD 215 mn to refinance outstanding debts and the remaining USD 50 mn to fund growth plans over a two-year period. The debt carries a 2.5-year grace period to give the company some breathing room due to covid-19. The loan brings the total number of debt arrangements EFG has advised on this year to seven, worth a combined EGP 9 bn.

Advisors: EFG Hermes was the financial advisor, lead manager, global coordinator and bookrunner for the transaction. CIB, Banque Misr, Banque du Caire, and HSBC acted as lead arrangers, while CIB also acted as the facility agent. MHR & Partners acted as legal counsel to ODE, while Helmy, Hamza & Partners acted as legal counsel to the banks providing the loan, ODE said in a bourse fling (pdf).

Google steers clear of Egypt with new Israel-Saudi fiber connection: Google has begun work on a major new fiber optic network between Israel and Saudi Arabia that will serve as a major new transit for global internet traffic, the Wall Street Journal reports, citing sources familiar with the matter. Codenamed Blue Raman, the line has been strategically placed to lessen reliance on Egypt, which is one of the busiest internet transit points in the world. Most Europe-India lines pass through Egypt, heightening the potential for serious disruption should the cables be damaged.

Operators aren’t enamored with Telecom Egypt’s sky-high fees either: The state-owned company charges operators some of the highest fees in the world for lines that cross its territory, adding up to 50% of the cost of a connection between Europe and India, industry analysts say.

STC eyeing another entry point to Egyptian market with digital payments arm? Saudi Telecom’s digital payments business STC Pay could enter the Egyptian market after it is given the regulatory greenlight to launch in other GCC countries next year, CEO Ahmed Alenazi told Reuters. The company is currently waiting on approvals to set up shop in the UAE, Kuwait, and Bahrain, which Alenazi said are the priority markets for now, with Egypt perhaps following at a later stage. STC has been in negotiations with Vodafone Group to acquire its 55% stake in Vodafone Egypt since January this year. Reports have suggested that the STC wants to break the deadlock over the valuation of the company and have a final agreement by the end of the year.

The Transport Ministry signed six railway agreements on the sidelines of the TransMea 2020 expo on Monday, covering the national railway, two planned electric train lines and Cairo’s metro network, a ministry statement said. These include two agreements with a Chinese consortium worth c. USD 530 mn to finance the second and third phases of the electric train route connecting Tenth of Ramadan City to the new administrative capital. Two pacts also covered civil works for the first round of Metro Line 4, while an MoU to conduct due diligence for the electric train that will connect West Port Said and Abu Qir and an agreement to set up a joint Chinese-Egyptian vocational training facility for railway technology were both signed. This came a day after the French Development Agency agreed to provide an EUR 50 mn loan to develop Cairo’s Metro Line 1.

We took a deep dive into Egypt’s transit hub and railway projects launched recently with the inauguration of the fourth phase Cairo Metro Line 3 in August. Read our coverage here.

Manufacturers could be allowed to reschedule unpaid natural gas bills over a period of up to 10 years, according to a local press report quoting Egyptian Federation of Investors Associations (EFIA) board member Sobhy Nasr. The EFIA has been lobbying officials to allow a 15-year period to reschedule the debt but the proposal was rejected by the Oil Ministry, which instead said it would consider a 10-year repayment period provided companies pay off their debts alongside new bills on a monthly basis. The ministry also said it would look into cutting prices to USD 3 / mmbtu from USD 4.5 currently at the end of this year or early 2021, and promised better energy infrastructure down the road, Nasr said. Manufacturers have been aggressively calling for a significant reduction in gas prices for the past few years.

The ministry refused to waive interest payments on the arrears and postponed discussions on cancelling fines for overconsumption to a later meeting. The government last summer approved a ministry proposal to write off EGP 5.3 bn in late fees and penalties incurred by factories.

Background: Long-term demands from factories for lower gas prices are now being more seriously considered by a newly-formed task force made up of EFIA and state-owned EGAS. The group will look at aligning local and international prices, waiving interest fees on late gas payments, and allowing debts to be paid in installments.

How Edita maintained its commitment to sustainability amid covid-19: Snackmaker Edita’s sustainability initiatives over the past year were largely focused on mitigating the fallout from the pandemic on all its stakeholders, including its employees, consumers, and wider community, it said in its latest sustainability report (pdf). The company also made “significant progress” in developing how it monitors its sustainability in 2019 and began reporting emissions reductions across the entire company, CEO Hani Berzi said. A new wastewater treatment plant at one of its facilities began operating last year, while the company is working to make more efficient use of raw materials and decrease the negative impact of its packaging on the environment, he said.

MOVES- Mohamed Moustafa Sheta has been appointed chairman and managing director of the Alexandria Mineral Oil Company (AMOC) by order of Oil Minister Tarek El Molla, Masrawy reports.

Mohamed Abbadi has been appointed managing director of the Red Sea National Refining and Petrochemical Company, also by order of El Molla.

Enterprise Explains: Repurchase agreements (repos). The Central Bank of Egypt (CBE) earlier this month extended the term of a repurchase agreement (or repo) it had inked with a consortium of international banks back in 2018. The agreement means the CBE will keep in its vaults some USD 3.8 bn in to shore up foreign currency reserves, giving it firepower to withstand swings in the exchange rate. It was the third such agreement reached since the EGP float in November 2016 and the subsequent USD 12 bn IMF loan agreement — in fact, securing a repo agreement and deposits from the GCC to increase its stock of foreign reserves were key conditions for the government to unlock the USD 12 bn IMF facility (click / tap here for the first agreement and here for the second one).

So what are repurchase agreements — and how do they work? In practice, repos are not all that different from your standard collateralized loan. One party borrows an amount of money from a lender in exchange for collateral and agrees to pay it back at a later date.

The thing is: repos are not actually loans. Technically speaking, there are no lenders and borrowers in a repurchase agreement. One party who wants some short-term liquidity (let’s say, a bank or an asset management fund) will sell a security (usually a safe, fixed-income asset such as a government bond) to a cash-rich buyer, such as a money market fund. The seller will agree to then repurchase the asset at a higher price at some point in the future. The difference in price is effectively the rate of interest the buyer is paying to acquire the cash (also known as the repo rate). As you can see, loans and repos see cash and collateral exchanged in the exact same way, the key difference being ownership.

Repo agreements are commonly used only for short-term liquidity needs, and the bulk of trades on the market are done on an overnight basis. Since it is highly unlikely the buyer will default or the security will go bad in such a short span of time, this makes them extremely safe trades which typically yield low rates of interest.

Repos can be made on the longer term though, and are technically known as “term repurchase agreements” when done over the span of months or years. This is exactly the kind of agreement that the CBE signed onto with international banks, trading long-term USD-denominated government bonds for cash for an initial 4.5-year period, which was last week extended to six years. While it’s atypical for repos to last longer than 1-2 years, the bank said that this serves to help authorities and policy makers increase the tenor of Egypt’s foreign debt.

The repo market is huge: Often referred to as the plumbing of the financial system, the cheap funding offered by the repo market means it is one of the principal ways that financial institutions such as investment banks and hedge funds cover short-term cash shortfalls. In the US alone, a typical day’s trading will see between USD 2-4 tn trading hands.

For more on the repo market:

• The basics: Check out Marketplace APM (watch, runtime: 8:09) and Khan Academy (watch, runtime: 11:24) for engaging explainers on repurchase agreements .
• What happens when the plumbing freezes? The Brookings Institute explains why the Federal Reserve poured tns of USD into the system last year.
• Going deeper: What is the FRA-OIS spread and what does it tell about risk in the banking sector? Moneyweek (watch, runtime: 9:52) and Bloomberg have more.

Meanwhile, over in Canada: You may have bigger problems, but if you’re in Canada’s Alberta province you should still make sure a moose doesn’t lick your car. They love licking the salt, and if they get used to being around cars it could ruin the habitat at Jasper National Park, CNN reports.

The detention of EIPR staff last week is still getting a lot of attention in the foreign press this morning: Reuters picks up a statement from the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR), which says that its director, Gaser Abdel Razek, is being held in solitary confinement. Meanwhile, the Telegraph carries an interview with the wife of another detained staffer, Karim Ennarah, and reports that the UK foreign secretary has raised concerns personally with Sameh Shoukry about the arrests. The Financial Times’ editorial board is out with a piece suggesting that Western countries should be more vocal about Egypt’s human rights record.

Integrated Diagnostics Holding CEO Hend El Sherbini grew a family-owned lab into a regional diagnostics giant operating 450 facilities in Egypt, Sudan, Nigeria and Jordan. We discuss enabling growth by creating corporate structure and institutionalizing the business, as well as the importance of consolidation in providing high quality, affordable healthcare, in this week’s episode of Making It.

You already have a podcast player on your iPhone, or you can listen to the episode through our website (no download required). We’re also on Google Podcasts | Anghami | Omny. Making It is on Spotify, but only for non-MENA accounts

The French are dominating coverage on the diplomacy front this morning after Orange CEO Stephane Richard met President Abdel Fattah El Sisi and French Transport Minister Jean-Baptiste Djebbari met with Civil Aviation Minister Mohamed Manar and led a delegation of 12 French companies on a visit to the new administrative capital.

Benya Capital has signed a USD 500 mn agreement with the Democratic Republic of Congo to set up a national fiber optic network on the sidelines of the Cairo ICT expo, Hapi Journal reports. The Egyptian IT infrastructure provider inked an initial agreement with the DRC in September.

Arab Contractors, Orascom Construction and Concord for Engineering and Contracting are now part of the consortium of companies contracted to build the high-speed electric rail from Ain Sokhna to Alamein, Al Mal reports, citing unnamed sources. The Transport Ministry had originally selected a consortium of China Railway Engineering Corporation, China Railway Construction Corporation Limited, the Arab Organization for Industrialization, and Samcrete for the project, but decided to increase the number of firms working on the project to speed up construction, sources said. The initial phase of the project will connect the new administrative capital and Borg Al Arab in Alexandria.

NI Capital is planning to launch a fixed-income investment fund, CEO Mohamed Metwaly said, according to Al Mal. NI’s parent company, the National Investment Bank (NIB), could contribute to the fund, Metwally said without providing further details. The launch would come as part of a strategy which will also see it expand its microfinance lending portfolio. NI Capital last week acquired Bank Audi’s Arabeya Online brokerage. Planning Minister and NIB Chairman Hala El Said at the time said the acquisition will allow the bank to expand its non-banking financial services offering.

State-owned Housing and Development Bank is planning to apply for a digital banking license from the Central Bank of Egypt (CBE), Chairman Hassan Ghanem told Masrawy. A growing number of Egyptian banks are planning entrances to the digital banking space, with the National Bank of Egypt, Banque Misr, Suez Canal Bank and ABC Egypt all mulling digital arms.

In related news: Non-banking financial services provider Ebtikar will launch a dedicated digital mobile wallet next year in collaboration with EG Bank, CEO Ayman El Dessouki told Hapi Journal. Ebtikar already runs the e-payments app Masary.

Meanwhile, another one of Ebtikar’s fintech firms, Bee Smart Payment Solutions, received central bank approval to facilitate electronic payments through Banque Misr, the company said in a statement cited by Masrawy.

Tourism developer Remco and two of its affiliate companies are in talks to obtain a two-tranche EGP 3.3 bn syndicated loan to refinance debt and lease payments and finance working capital, the company said in a regulatory filing (pdf). Banque Misr is joining several other unnamed banks and leasing companies to arrange the loan.

Marsa Alam for Tourism Development is in negotiations with a local bank for a EGP 450 mn loan to cover running costs, sources told Al Shorouk.

El Nasr Automotive is in negotiations with a syndicate of local banks for a EGP 2 bn loan to fund the establishment of a factory for electric vehicles, sources told Al Shorouk. China’s Dongfeng signed a MoU last month to assemble electric cars at El Nasr’s facilities.

HD Leasing is in talks with unnamed local banks to obtain EGP 1 bn to expand its lending portfolio, Managing Director Ayman Tobar told Al Mal.

Orascom Construction will take a 15% stake in the newly founded National Company for Railways Industries, CEO Osama Bishai told Al Mal. Samcrete and Hassan Allam will also hold stakes in the new company, along with the Sovereign Fund of Egypt and the SCZone.

Banque Misr has sold its entire 9.48% stake in the Rowad Tourism Company for EGP 22.7 mn, according to an EGX disclosure (pdf).

We have lots and lots of sports news for you this morning, starting with the fact that Cairo will host the Confederation of African Football (CAF) Super Cup this year instead of Qatar, CAF said in a statement. The tourney was originally scheduled for August. The release does not say when it will be held. In less cheery football news

Carrying the Egyptian flag abroad: Yara Atef has been named to the referee team for the 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup, due to be held in New Zealand and Australia, while pole vaulting champion and record-holder Yasmen Hazem is set to join the University of Maine in the upcoming spring semester as a scholarship athlete, Bangor Daily News reports.

Meanwhile: Mohamed Ramadan finds out that making new friends isn’t always a good thing. The singer has been suspended by the Egyptian Union of Artistic Syndicates after photos of him posing with Israeli artists surfaced online, Al Shorouk reports. The syndicate will reportedly conduct an investigation into why Ramadan was pictured with people hailing from the “usurping entity.” So much for cultural diplomacy…