The EGX30 closed at its highest ever level as it inched up 0.79% in yesterday’s trading, ending the day at 13,626.8 points. Foreigners were net buyers and responsible for 47.3% total volume traded, according to data from Pharos Holding.

Trade and Industry Minister Tarek Kabil imposed antidumping duties on steel imports, according to Al Borsa. The decision directly target imports from China, Turkey, and Ukraine with duties ranging from 10% to 27%.

Companies Act on cabinet’s agenda today: The Ismail cabinet will be discussing the much-anticipated Companies Act during its meeting today, Al Ahram reports, citing comments from Investment Minister Sahar Nasr.

Export costs for its natural gas are rising, shipping lines can’t get into its ports, its stockexchange is tanking. It’s not a great day to be Qatar. We have more in this morning’s Speed Round, below, as the ongoing diplomatic battle pitting Qatar against Egypt, Saudi and the UAE continues to dominate world political and economic headlines.

WSJ declares that the global market for natural gas is now a real thing: Longtime readers will know that we’ve been saying since among our first issues a couple of years ago that there was an emerging global market for natural gas. Previously, conventional wisdom had it that the cost and permanence of the infrastructure required to trade the stuff would always make the trade a point-to-point thing. Well, when the Wall Street Journal declares that Long Promised, the Global Market for Natural Gas Has Finally Arrived, you know it must be real. “Liquefied gas, new infrastructure and revamped contracts have changed the calculus for consumers, countries and companies,” the newspaper writes in a front-page feature.

The key quote: “Behind the evolution is improving technology for moving gas as a liquid, which means it can go to many more places rather than simply where a pipeline runs. In addition, a glut of gas has producers working to develop new consumers all over the world. The result is growing flexibility in once-rigid gas contracts and a convergence in prices long dictated by local factors such as weather.”

Vodafone is the first global brand doing something about where its ads appear online.We’ve given a lot of thought to the evils of programmatic advertising on the interwebs, which is basically the practice of using “software to purchase digital advertising, as opposed to the traditional process that involves RFPs, human negotiations and manual insertion orders. It’s using machines to buy ads.” It’s a practice that has historically rewarded those who produce [redacted] content and often associates solid brands with sleaze. (It’s also a hotbed of fraud. See as well this primer on the sector from Media Week back in March.) Hats off to Vodafone, then, for becoming the first major global brand to work with its advertising partners to come up with a way of making sure its ad spending doesn’t support purveyors of sleaze and hawkers of fake news. Read Vodafone’s press release here. The move is getting plenty of coverage in industry staples including Marketing Week (registration required) and Campaign and has crossed over into the mainstream business press (cf: Financial Times).

Adnan Kashoggi is dead. The flamboyant Saudi arms trader was an international figure and free-spending icon of the 1970s and early-to-mid 1980s who had fingers in pies as far-flung as the Iran-Contra scandal and the Marcos family of the Philippines. The New York Times has his obit, writing that “His appetites were gargantuan, beyond the limits of vulgarity” as it name-checks his numerous estates and what was, at one time, the world’s largest yacht.
So, when do we eat? Maghrib prayers are at 6:55pm CLT in Cairo, and the cutoff time for sohour is 3:08am