Egypt will issue sovereign sukuk (Islamic bonds) with ijara contracts around the beginning of the next fiscal year, which starts July 2015, Finance Minister Hany Qadry announced in a press conference Thursday.
Sukuk ijara are lease-based, implying that bondholders are owners of the asset and are entitled to receive revenues when the asset is leased.
A law issued in 2012 to regulate the issuance of sukuk by both the government and the private sector is currently being amended and is expected soon.
Egypt would deprive itself of around $4-5 billion in sources of finance if it missed out on tapping the international sukuk market, which traded around $116 billion last year, Egypt's head financial regulator, Sherif Samy, told Ahram Online earlier this week.
