Banking shares push Egypt's bourse higher

CAIRO: A banking sector buoyed after Italy s Sanpaolo won 80 percent of Bank of Alexandria for about $1.6 billion helped Egyptian shares edge higher on Tuesday, traders said. The auction for the state-owned bank was one of the largest Egyptian privatizations of the year and a landmark in the process of reducing the state s role in the Egyptian economy. The banking sector as a whole received a lot of interest due to the price of the Sanpaolo deal, which beat expectations, said Mohamed Radwan of Delta Securities. The deal even boosted Commercial International Bank , one of the candidates shortlisted in the competition for Bank of Alexandria. Shares in the bank closed 4.8 percent higher at LE 52.50 ($9.16) a share. National Societe Generale Bank rose 3.6 percent to LE 47.05 a share. Watany Bank s shares also climbed 3.9 percent to LE 27.04 per share. Other top gainers included Egyptian Resorts company, whose shares rose 5 percent to LE 68.83, extending its bullish run after a Jordanian firm announced last month it would invest $2 billion in developing for leisure and residential purposes a site on the Red Sea coast. Egyptian Resorts have a huge piece of land in the same area … their land is worth a lot more now, said Yasser Hassanein of Dynamic Securities. Shares in Investment Bank EFG-Hermes edged 1.2 percent higher to LE 41.97. HSBC upgraded EFG-Hermes, a stock popular with retail investors, to overweight from neutral on Tuesday. The well-watched Case 30 index ended 0.6 percent higher at 6,400.23 points, the Hermes index went up 0.4 percent to 56,967.85 points and the broader CIBC 100 index ended 0.5 higher at 258.75 points. The market started off on a high but there was some selling later because we are close to a technical resistance level at 6,500 points, said Hassanein, referring to the CASE 30 index.