Egypt’s foreign currency reserves inched up USD 24 mn in October, reaching USD 40.85 bn from USD 40.83 bn in September, according to official figures released yesterday.

An undisclosed institutional investor is looking to buy a stake of up to 5% in pharma giant Rameda. The shares belong to an individual investor, according to a bourse filing (pdf) by the company. The company’s OGM will be deciding on the matter on 25 November, as the lockup period post-IPO has not yet ended.

Cleopatra Hospital Group is purchasing a brownfield project in East Cairo from Al Marasem Development, Cleopatra’s IR Director Hassan Fikry told Enterprise. The acquisition is still pending approvals from the Health Ministry, according to an EGX disclosure (pdf).

Six new licenses to manufacture steel products are now up for grabs, and the Industrial Development Authority is inviting iron ore, direct reduced iron, and iron billet makers to bid, it said in a statement (pdf). The licenses will be offered as part of a tender that will run between 7 and 18 November. They include three permits to set up billet factories with an annual production capacity of 1.1 mn tonnes each, one to manufacture 2.5 mn tonnes of direct reduced iron a year, and two to make iron ore with a capacity of 8 mn tonnes for each plant. Egypt has had in place import tariffs on iron billets and steel rebars since April 2019, with an eye to gradually tapering off the rates over a three-year period from the date of rolling out the tariffs.

Al Futtaim Group Real Estate is in talks with unnamed local banks to finance new projects in New Cairo expected to cost up to EGP 8 bn, Managing Director Ashraf Ezz El Din tells Al Mal. The new projects include two four- and five-star hotels with a total of 500 rooms, as well as an administrative building near Cairo Festival City.