The United States dollar has lost more than 122 piasters against the pound since the beginning of the year until operations ended last Thursday.
The average price of the dollar in banking transactions with customers last weekend reached EGP 16.6475 pounds for purchase and EGP 16.7475 pounds for sale, compared to EGP 17.8708 for purchase and EGP 17.9564 for sale on January 2, 2019.
The official average price of the dollar at the Central Bank of Egypt (CBE) last Thursday was EGP 16.6292 for purchase and EGP 16.7512 for sale, compared to EGP 17.8539 for purchase and EGP 17.9743 for sale at the beginning of the year.
Egypt received strong foreign exchange inflows during the recent period, which has pushed the US currency to depreciate against the pound.
Governor of the CBE, Tarek Amer, estimated that the volume of these flows, since November 2015 until now, would be about $200bn.
Fakhry El-Fiky, member of the CBE’s board of directors said that the volume of foreign investments in government debt instruments from January to May 2019 amounted to about $5bn, to reach more than $17bn.
