The board of Egypt Kuwait Holding (EKH) approved resuming its USD 20 mn buyback program  to purchase 14.85 mn of its shares from the EGX, equivalent to 1.45% of the company’s total share capital, according to a regulatory filing (pdf). The company began its program to purchase treasury stock earlier this year, when the Financial Regulatory Authority eased rules in March allowing companies to complete same-day buybacks in a bid to support share prices. EKH’s buyback program, which is expected to continue until January 2021, has so far seen the company buyback around 2.7 mn shares. The relaxed regs pushed a handful of other businesses to engage in an unprecedented wave of buybacks over the past four months in response to the market turbulence that came in the wake of the covid-19 pandemic. “The mechanics that allow program is to reflect long term support of the share price according to market dynamics taking into account the high level of uncertainty that the capital markets are facing,” the company said in a statement to Enterprise.

CLARIFICATION – 16 July 2020

Added context to the story to clarify that the announcement was on the resumption of the program, and that so far 2.7 mn shares had been purchased. The clarification also includes quotes from the company on the buyback program.