On Sunday, the Central Bank of Egypt said it sold about EGP 87.1bn in 91-day treasury bills. A source has revealed that the demand for government bills was driven by purchase requests submitted by Gulf and foreign investment funds. According to the source, hard currency inflows prompted the Egyptian Ministry of Finance to sell treasury bills at a high-interest rate to secure dollars and support the local currency.

The ministry raised the average interest rate on 91-day treasury bills by about 30 points to reach 20.520%, compared to 20.281% in the previous bid last week. According to experts, Sunday’s bid results reflected investors’ focus on hot investments, as the ministry also offered to sell EGP 21 billion in 273-day bills. Last Thursday, the Central Bank of Egypt sold 182-day and 364-day treasury bills for 82.246 billion Egyptian pounds. About two weeks ago, the bank sold dollar-denominated treasury bills for $850 million.