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Sunday, 4 November 2018

What we’re tracking on 4 November 2018

** Our apologies for being a few minutes late this morning, but we had some technical issues with our dispatch engine. They’re solved now and we’ll be back to our usual time tomorrow.

It is an exceptionally busy news morning with an unprecedented six-month suspension handed on Thursday to the investment banking arm of one of the nation’s “Big Five” firms and the murder by Islamist terrorists of at least seven Coptic pilgrims this weekend.

That presages a busy month. November is always packed, between the scramble to close transactions before year’s end and the House of Representatives hitting its stride. Highlights in the coming days will include:

  • The Markit / Emirates NBD purchasing managers’ index for Egypt will be out tomorrow morning;
  • US sanctions on Iranian oil go into effect tomorrow;
  • The release of a draft of the SME Act, which will aim to bring more businesses into the formal economy;
  • The central bank next reviews interest rates on 15 November.

Will Egypt get an exemption from America’s sanctions on Iranian oil? The US will temporarily allow eight countries, including Japan, India and South Korea, to continue buying Iranian oil after it imposes sanctions Tehran this week in an effort to prevent oil prices from jumping, a senior US government official told Bloomberg. The exemption is contingent on these countries cutting off other Iranian imports. The news raises the question of whether Egypt, which, as CNBC notes imports Iranian oil for its Sumed pipeline, will be included on the list. The UAE, China and Turkey could also be included in the list, which is expected to be formally announced tomorrow.

Oh, and The Donald would very much like you to know that sanctions are coming, tweeting the following image over the weekend (and prompting speculation, after a top Iranian official responded in kind, that we have reached peak stupid in international relations):

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