The Central Bank of Egypt (CBE) set new regulations for banks to obtain dollars during the CBE’s FX Auctions held three times a week, according to banking sources.
The CBE holds the auctions for banks to obtain dollars on Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays.
The sources told Daily News Egypt that the banks’ acquisition of dollars is dependent on their efficiency in providing foreign exchange to the market.
This is determined through the evaluation of three factors, the source said, noting that the first relates to credit facilitations in foreign currency provided to clients to meet their foreign exchange requirements.
The second factor is the number of clients whose foreign exchange is covered by the bank, especially small clients. The third factor is related to the extent of the banks’ flexibility in meeting their clients’ foreign exchange requirements by opening currency centres within the authorised limits.
The CBE regulations underlined the need for banks to arrange credit facilitations in foreign exchange with correspondents abroad, to finance letters of credit, and work to increase their foreign exchange resources.
During Thursday’s auction, the CBE set the sale price of the dollar at banks at EGP 7.73. It sold $39.3m to banks, and the allocation percentage stood at 35.7%, while the CBE rejected some dollar requests by banks.
The CBE raised the average coverage of requests to 57% in the auction held last Tuesday, marking a 150% increase compared to the rate of previous auctions’ coverage, which was about 19.5%.
Dollar sale prices at banks are stable at a bidding price of EGP 7.78 and an asking price of EGP 7.83.
