The Central Bank of Egypt (CBE) is set to consider interest rates next Thursday, according to its website, amid expectations of keeping them on hold as inflation rates dropped in June.
In its last meeting in June, the CBE’s Monetary Policy Committee decided to keep the overnight deposit and lending rates “unchanged” at 8.75 percent and 9.75 percent respectively.
The committee also maintained CBE’s main operation and the discount rate unchanged at 9.25 percent each.
Egypt’s core annual inflation rate declined a slight to 8.07 percent in June, down from 8.14 percent in May, the CEB announced in its monthly report.
Meanwhile, Egypt’s annual urban consumer inflation dropped to 11.4 percent in June from 13.1 percent in May, the Central Agency for Public Mobilization and Statistics (CAPMAS) reported.
CAPMAS attributed the decline mainly to an 11.8 percent slip in vegetables’ prices last month, while meat and poultry prices hiked 1.4 percent.
Inflation soared in Egypt last summer after the government cut energy subsidies by 40 billion EGP ($5.11 billion) in July, 2014, raising fuel prices by up to 78 percent.
Key policy rates were kept on hold since February after they saw the last change in January, when the MPC slashed them by 50 basis points each, on speculation of lower inflation.
This was the first action since they were raised by 100 basis points each last July, in an effort to curb soaring inflation after slashing fuel subsidy.
