Cairo – Mubasher: Egypt has signed an agreement with Belgium-based Euroclear, the largest securities settlement firm in Europe, to enable holders of Egyptian sovereign debt to clear overseas transactions as of a six-month period, the Egyptian finance minister told Reuters.
The North African state seeks to unveil a new sovereign debt issue by the end of September, Mohamed Maait said in a phone interview, hoping the new notes would be eligible for clearing through the Belgian company.
Maait noted that the state plans to launch the first part of the “euroclearable” sovereign debt in October.
The Egyptian government is mulling over the issuance of “green bonds, samurai, panda, sukuk, and infrastructure bonds,” he highlighted.
In the same vein, Euroclear said in a press release that the agreement would help “create the right market conditions for local currency sovereign debt issuance.”
“The intention is for the market to eventually become Euroclearable, creating a cross-border link to enable international investment in Egyptian domestic debt instruments,” Euroclear added.
In March, the Egyptian Ministry of Finance (MoF) announced the issuance of Eurobonds worth $4 billion with maturities of five years, ten years, and 30 years.
Egypt seeks to cut borrowing costs by counting on Eurobond issuances instead of the country's domestic high-yield debt.
