Egypt successfully sold USD 3 bn of eurobonds in last Thursday’s issuance — a sale that was 3x oversubscribed, according to a Finance Ministry statement on Friday. Egypt received offers for USD 9 bn on USD-denominated bonds, with 6-, 12-, and 30-year tenors. Egypt sold USD 1.125 bn worth of 6-year notes at a yield of 5.8%, USD 1.125 bn in 12-year notes at a yield of 7.3%, and USD 750 mn in 30-year bonds at 8.75%.

Final yields were cut by as much as 32.5 bps thanks to the strong demand among the 300 participating investors. Egypt had offered the 6-year bonds at a yield of 6.125%, while the 12- and 30-year bonds carried yields of 7.625% and 8.875%, respectively. Egypt last tapped international markets back in February with a USD 3.75 bn in USD-denominated eurobond sale that was 4x oversubscribed.

But our yields and interest rates are still among the highest in the world: The emerging markets that are best prepared to manage the impact of the US Fed’s stimulus tapering are those that are sitting on positive interest rates, “and Egypt is at the forefront of that,” with real interest rates at around 3%, Hasnain Malik, who heads equities research at Tellimer, told Bloomberg TV on Thursday (watch, runtime: 6:58).

Advisers: HSBC, FAB, Citibank, Standard Chartered, and JP Morgan advised on the sale.

On your marks, get set, sell: Egypt has joined the growing list of emerging-market governments that have gone to the international debt markets in recent days wanting to capitalize on the low-rate environment before the US Federal Reserve and other central banks begin to taper stimulus measures. The past week alone saw governments and companies issue USD 36 bn in USD- and EUR-denominated debt after the previous 10 weeks saw only USD 90 bn raised, according to Bloomberg. “Sales from Indonesia, Turkey, Chile, Serbia and Hungary were all met with robust investor demand,” it notes.

EMs that are not doing well? EMs with negative real interest rates will have the hardest time with the Fed’s tapering, including places like Argentina, Nigeria and Poland, says Malik. Here in the region, Saudi Arabia is particularly vulnerable with a -4.7% real interest rate. That has driven a lot of liquidity out of fixed income and into equities, he noted.