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Egyptian Pound Plummets As Egyptians Get Their First Taste Of A Bank Run
Today, for the first time in two weeks, the Egyptian banking system will be open, and the result: huge lines and a very possible bank run at the 200 or so banks which the Egyptian central bank announced would be open between 10:00 am and 1:30 pm today. And just to make things a little bit easier (yet harder) on itself, courtesy of a withdrawal limit of 50,000 Egyptian pounds and $10,000 a day, depositors will take out the max which should promptly deplete bank stores, and also set the population on edge, which withdrawal limits tend to do virtually everywhere. Also, the Egyptian central bank, which has one upped Blackhawk Ben, and been restocking through a military cargo plane, will soon need a far bigger one: "The central bank moved 5 billion pounds ($854 million) of
cash into the financial system as depositors gained access to
their savings. The regulator, which has $36 billion in reserves
and guarantees deposits, used military cargo planes to bring in
the funds, Governor Farouk El-Okdah said yesterday on state-run
television." And another lesson Egypt has learned from both the US and the EU: mask any smell of insolvency with that truty old pyramid scheme known as bond issuance: "The government plans to sell 15 billion pounds in treasury bills tomorrow after canceling last week’s auction as protests against Mubarak intensified. Yields on Egypt’s bills may surge about 30 percent, said Shahinaz Foda, the head of treasury at BNP Paribas Egypt."
More from Bloomberg:
Egypt’s stock exchange will remain shut until at least Feb. 8, communications manager Hisham Turk said in a telephone interview today.
The central bank postponed the sale of 4 billion pounds planned for Jan. 30 after raising 2.5 billion pounds on Jan. 27. The average yields on the sale of 182-day bills jumped 40 basis points to a one-year high of 10.6 percent, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
The bank plans to auction 8 billion pounds in 91-day bills, 5 billion pounds in 182-day bills and 2 billion pounds in 273- day bills, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The bank will announce the results Feb. 8, Deputy Governor Hisham Ramez said yesterday.
Yields on three-month treasury bills should be “not less than” 12.5 percent in upcoming auctions, up from 9.5 percent last month, Cairo-based Foda said yesterday. The yield on the one-year bills may climb to 14 percent from 10.6 percent, she said.
Yet even revolution-torn Egypt refuses to proceed with the kind of fiscal largess that is the only thing that the Obama administration is known for 2 years in:
In an attempt to placate the protesters, newly appointed Finance Minister Samir Radwan reiterated yesterday that the government won’t reduce subsidies even if global prices of food and commodities rise. Public spending will be used as a tool to “achieve social justice,” he told a news conference in Cairo.
An increase in public spending may push the budget gap to “double digits” in 2011, compared with 8.1 percent in the fiscal year that ended in June, rating company Standard & Poor’s said last week after lowering the country’s credit ratings a notch to two levels below investment grades. Fitch Ratings and Moody’s Investors Service also cut Egypt’s ratings.
The unrest sent the yield on the country’s 5.75 percent bond due in April 2020 to a record 7.2 percent on Jan. 31. The yield has dropped 62 basis points since and ended the week at 6.59 percent. The cost of insuring Egypt’s debt for five years with credit-default swaps soared to 430 basis points on Jan. 28, the highest since April 2009. They closed at 380 on Feb. 4, CMA prices in London show.
So no subsidies, even though most grains continue to trade limit up? In that case can we just call this attempt at halting the revolution what it really is: half time?
As for that bank run:
Radwan said Egypt will honor its debt obligations and urged foreign investors to have confidence in the country. “All the bond obligations, everything will be honored on time,” Radwan said in a Feb. 4 telephone interview from Cairo. “We are not defaulting on any obligations.”
Banks held 937 billion Egyptian pounds in deposits in November, according to preliminary data published on the central bank’s website. Of that, households held 505 billion pounds, while private companies held 124 billion, the data show. The country’s banks have an average loan-to-deposit ratio of about 53 percent, Mohamed Barakat, head of the banking association, said in an interview on Jan. 30.
At least Ben Bernanke can sleep soundly, knowing that non-USD denominated currencies, and therefore those under which he has absolutely no control, are about to take the fall for his monteray policies.
Egypt’s three-month non-deliverable pound forwards strengthened 0.2 percent to 6.325 per dollar on Feb. 4 from 6.34 the previous day, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The contracts reflect bets the currency will weaken 7.4 percent in three months from the spot rate of 5.8570. A drop in the pound may prompt the central bank to intervene, John Sfakianakis, chief economist at Banque Saudi Fransi Credit Agricole Group, said in a note Feb. 3.
“Over the short term we expect the Egyptian pound to fall by 20 percent, which would require the central bank to intervene on several occasions,” he wrote. “The drawdown in reserves would be a crucial factor in supporting the Egyptian pound, but increased political tensions, a run on local banks as well as expected dollarization of some of the deposits will impact the short-term currency outlook.”
The central bank doesn’t have a target range for the pound, Ramez told CNBC Arabiya today. The central bank intervenes in “rare” cases, he said.
Expect many more "rare" cases over the next few weeks...
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More ZH scare tactics here. All the Egyptian central bank needs to do is print more money. How long does that take. Get real.
Yeah, ZH loves scare tactics. I'm sure all is well with the banking system in Egypt.
Knobs.
Brilliant, bumpkin... and to think the financial crisis is all an illusion.
The bank runs have already started HERE (quietly). Best get at least some of your FRNs OUT of the banks, and if you own no gold, well then, get some ASAP. Another ZH thread just this evening claims silver is backwardation, as far out as until 2015. That is significant. If gold ever backwardates like that, then that is the END GAME, no more physical...
Beware and prepare! Now!
Is that yet ANOTHER sock puppet?
Member 1 week 4 days.
Longevity snob.
Riddle me this smart guy - if your solution to the problem of (food) inflation (and unemployment) that caused riots is to print more money - how does that actually help the inflation problem? Oh, it actually makes inflation worse.
Debasing currency never solves anything. Sure, more depositors might have currency in their hands but then it becomes hot money. They actively want to buy goods with their money in order to preserve purchasing power. And that's how inflation sets in...
Nice attempt at hijacking the thread though. It wouldn't be another week at ZH without a new disinformation troll.
I may be wrong, trader Joe. But methinks you got your sense of humour shot off during the last HFT crash.
I don't care how long you have been here. I don't like it when people who have been here for a long time create sock puppets to troll with. You look like one such person, who originally posted as MeTarzanUJane, who has since taken to using said sock puppets to act like an asshole. Whenever you see a fairly new account posting one-liners against gold, it tends to be him.
Am I the only one who took this as sarcasm??
No, but that doesn't mean it was sarcasm.
Only dingleberry would know.
Friend, truth is scary, and all you bent over ostriches are inviting unwelcome sexual experiences. So go ahead and disparage a great source of information and opinion which has ofen been right on the money before anyone else. Enjoy.
More ZH scare tactics here. All the Egyptian central bank needs to do is print more money. How long does that take. Get real.
Fragrantdingleberry,
You Fucking egyptian government shill, go back to sucking Mubarak dick. Get out.
More ZH scare tactics here. All the Egyptian central bank needs to do is print more money. How long does that take. Get real.
Fragrantdingleberry,
You Fucking egyptian government shill, go back to sucking Mubarak dick. Get out.
Fuck the Palace. Time to occupy the Central Bank.
Hey, that's great! All central banks should print more money and we can all become millions and retire? Will we hire the new millions to cut our lawns? Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.
You people know nothing of economics. Great thinkers like Paul Krugman and James Galbraith have argued convincingly, using proven econometric models, that printing money in times of economic distress is the only way to stave off collapse. Too many tea baggers on this site.
LOL!
Great thinkers.
You'll be a welcome addition to the chuckle machine.
Hmm, not so sure... now we have a regular trolls, sarcastic trolls, trolls trolling trolls, drive-by trolls... would be nice if we got some newcomers who were actually interested in discussing issues instead of posting lame and rather obvious jokes, in an attempt to harvest "junks".
Many of them trolls are actually paid to troll the web in order to steer the discussion for their continued social engineering agenda.
Works on TV and on the streets great. Not so good on the web where a gun is not held to your head.
They use the Diamond technique on us here at ZH a lot too.
Check out how they do it;
Here are some strategies collectivists use to control public meetings.
HOW COLLECTIVISTS USE THE DIAMOND TACTIC TO
SWAY PUBLIC MEETINGS AND HOW TO THWART THEM
by G. Edward Griffin
http://www.dailypaul.com/42663/g-edward-griffins-tips-for-delegates
as a relative newb to ZH and refugee from various other forums (RIP, GIM, and it appears GLP now too), one of the good things about ZH is the contributors' tendency to very quickly identify trolls. the various takes on harry have been mildly entertaining, too.
This must be the latest incarnation of Toathis... Your posts are almost identical.
What we have on this site are people who are critcal thinkers, questioners of the status quo. You are a name dropping shill.
If these people have so convincingly argued their points... link those areguments so that others can see what you find so convincing. Let us examine these "proven econometric" models (and all the assumptions they are based on).
Thanks for the critique. Now that I think about it, you're probably right.
thanks for the LOL this morning!
try the veal ...
laughter is good for the soul
I'm still laughing about this post
"proven econometric models"
this guy should do standup comedy
You have a mind infested with more cliches than a street dog has fleas.
I junked you for your basic stupidity re: "proven" econometric models. Moron.
This is sarcasm, just like Wanger. They are masters of the surreptitious.
Egypts central bank is a UK bank you dumbfuck. UK is broke off it's ass.
You people know nothing of economics. Great thinkers like Paul Krugman and James Galbraith have argued convincingly, using proven econometric models, that printing money in times of economic distress is the only way to stave off collapse. Too many tea baggers on this site.
;))
"POMO-ADE, the Growth Thirst Mutilator - Rich in "electronlytes". Pour it on everything and watch it grow!"
wow, you really are giving the egyptian people too much credit Tyler!
If they had $10k in savings in the bank there wouldnt be the kind of mess that there is !!! get real, no more than EGP 1k is being withdrawn by 70% of depositors; the remaining 30% might withdraw a bit more, but the people that actually have $10k in their account available to them is less than 5% of the population.....
and you are maybe giving too much credit to the Egypt's financial system, bro.
I think he's got a point: this is done to enable those with wealth to get it, and get the hell out.
It presages more struggle to come, and it's orchestrated to prepare the battlefield.
Could be, but those with wealth don't hold it with Egyptian banks, more like Zurich, Caymans or whatever.
I think it's more about the petty bourgeoisie than the big ones like the (Mu)Barak family. But you're no-doubt right about their ilk.
Agreeable, since middle class could be left for later to be milked for their remaining hard currency, thank God precedents existed in the past: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torgsin
People with wealth use a new invention called "wire transfer". People standing in line at the banks are mostly employees waiting to get access to their monthly salaries in order to eat.
Ironically, the Egyptian currency does not appear to feature an illustration of a pyramid.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egyptian_pound
It's kinda funny that pictures of important economic ideas never make it onto money. The money from Egypt doesn't have a picture of a pyramid, and the money from The Ben Bernank doesn't have a picture of Johannes Gutenberg.
Which is understandable, since only a fraction of what Bernanke is 'printing' appears in a paper form, even expression 'printing money out of thin air' is a ridiculous overstatement since he is not even even using proportionate amount of air except for the one he is breathing himself to produce money, it's mostly electrons circulating over the networks to reflect effects of quantitative easing. Thus, we all should pray that Ernest Rutherford be pictured on the next 10^9 US banknotes.
Well I'm sure the platoons we just deployed will help straighten this mess out. They always have in the past.
Interesting. I'm sure the U.S. military will be there for keeping nationals safe. They would never use that as cover to meddle in the affairs of a foreign nation.
Pyramids closed for 10th straight day.
1 million tourists have gone and $3.4b lost, according to Al Jazeera's report.
Financial prospects lookin' just a little bleak. Perhaps a little financial panic will accelerate the "orderly tradition" to a new lackey.
gosh. I wonder who will become the new & lucky holders of Egyptian bonds?
Church of England, I hope.
Most Egyptians are totally uneducated and broke. They don't even know where the bank is.....
That's what a fascist regime does to a country. My parents grew up in Cairo and like most educated Egyptians (doctors, engineers, scientists, architects, entrepreneurs) they left for greener pastures.
That right, al-Zawahiri got out of Dodge as soon as they released him from prison.
Holy shit, I didn't know you were Egyptian!
To paraphrase: "We are all Egyptians now".
So you're saying they are 10 times more valuable than you are. You fucknut.
Keeping OT:
The link below is to an annotated agenda from the following conference. A quick read is tragically funny.
Beating Inflation, sustaining growth
http://www.sis.gov.eg/En/Story.aspx?sid=954 (So far ahead of the curve and so unable to do anything about it.)U.S. underbanked (and nonbanked) population estimates run about 43 million. There is a familiar number!
By the way, the people here in the U.S. could care less about Egypt. Everyone is totally pumped up for today's Superbowl.
And last night's AMA Supercross race in Anaheim Stadium was 100% sold out, 46,000 seats at $55/pop. Everyone was partying.
Here's Robot posing with some Monster Energy "FemBot" models..
LOL...
As usual, James Stewart ran away with the win. Nobody could touch him.
Can we take a ZH poll on who wins the Stupid Bowl? Will it be the democrats or republicans? Go teaming instinct.
on Sun, 02/06/2011 - 12:32
#938877
Can we take a ZH poll on who wins the Stupid Bowl? Will it be the democrats or republicans? Go teaming instinct.
***************************************************************************
Clampit,
You, Clampit... win the "Stupid Bowl"... There is NO! difference between the two party system participants... http://www.opensecrets.org/
The two party's allow you and / or others to believe there are differences / choices... thusly freedom.
You are not free to choose, no one is...
Sincerely, JW
Um, nice rant but I've been Libertarian all my voting life. I think most here are. As for not being free to choose, you could write in Robert Kahre ... ;-)
The point I was making is one big game fosters the other.
As a Cowboys fan I'm personally rooting for Injuries.
Dude, you look totally doable.
I would have had my arms around them--and a hard on!
I like the effective use of the push 'em up vests--who says engineering is dry and boring?
dp
RobotTrader
Wow, Gay guys really do hang with the hot chicks.
I wonder how many times per day you google yourself?
That girl on the far right is super hot
I'll take the two on the left.
That girl on the far right is super hot
Dude, I totally feel for that, I just bought 64GB IPod yesterday, this crap despite being physically heavy, loses battery 100 times before it can play all the pirated songs stored in its memory.
Which one's you?
Not sure how you are able to round up my last four girlfriends and get them to pose with you. They generally like em a little bigger. Wallets, that is.
You are all Kardashian's now.
What is her name; the model in the shorts?
Guessing you were a banker in the South Bay at one time?
Egypt is fine. The economy is fine. Mubarack is fine. Food prices are fine. The Suez canal will be fine. Don't worry about the price of oil. The Muslim Brotherhood is just an Egyptian motorcycle club. Benanke has it all under control and Obama is on our side and he knows best.
Win!
Super Bowl moment!
-- Baghdad Bob
not to be one-upped, upon reading the news, the bernank has decided to trade his fleet of helicopters in for some B-52's.
i m still learning ....will post the next time i discover something ......very soon....till then ...
http://markettechnicals-jonak.blogspot.com/
Can someone please explain the part about the subsidies? Article says they won't reduce subsidies and comment says no subsidies.
At second glance, the Finance Minister's comment makes no sense. I wonder if he misspoke and meant subsidies won't be reduced even if global food prices decline. What say you, TD?
Bread is subsidized in Egypt, and it costs about a penny-per-loaf right now. In other words, they're the difference between stability and chaos.
There has been a lot of talk, with the banker-gangsters blowing food bubbles, that the subsidies would have to be reduced because of Egypt's debt to ... surprise ... the same banker-gangsters.
That's basically what set this whole thing off.
Right, so as wheat carries on its upwards trajectory, Egypt's finances will become unstable, the subsidy will be cut, and the riots will kick off again.
And we all thought you were just another pretty face.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/17/world/africa/17bread.html
This maybe a stupid question but how can the EGP plummet when it is pegged to the USD?
Have never actually traded EGP, but a quick internet search suggests that the peg was broken in 2003. Do you know more about that?
I don't know about the EGP but the Egyptian economy is pegged to U.S. foreign aid and the peace treaty with Israel. When the MB takes over, the peg will be to Iran and U.S. warships will be in full attack mode as war breaks out in the Middle East.
Do you mean the Cowardly Muslim Lackeys & Collaborators?
An authentic 'Brotherhood' would have gone to Tahrir on Wednesday to stand with the Brothers you marched with the day before.
Instead, you meet at Wendy's with the Intelligence Chief.
Bitches.
"as war breaks out in the Middle East"
are events in Egypt just the latest effort by TPTB to create the next war?
Iran war - fail
N. Korea war - fail
Egypt war - ???
central bankers around the world need a major war to hide the collapsing global economy - a major war accomplishes at least two things:
1. gives the bankers something to blame for the failure of the economy - "we were on our way to recovery until the war started ..."
2. provides a distraction for the sheeple - the sheeple don't get excited about the collapsing economy as long as there is some good TV coverage of the war
This is exactly what happened. The Chinese are playing an integral role in what is about to happen.
The beautiful women of Egypt will never give up their fashionable sun glasses, cell phones, and cars to jump into full body upholstery burkas, wearing what resembles ghost Halloween costumes 24/7/365.
Why not just stop at "I don't know"?
A voice of reason, crying in the wilderness... :>D
Awesome...fighting for social justice is now a direct cause of economic implosion. Anyone still think that money, in any of its forms, is a good idea?
This crisis started against rising food prices. Since then, food hoarding, civil unrest, crime, bank runs et all have'nt helped. "Just print money" means even higher prices as the value of the EgyPd plummets. Egypt's new rulers might not like what they inherit.
On the ground report from the International Socialist Organization's reporter in Tahrir Square. Useful stuff, no matter your politics, from a reporter familiar with and hostile to NED Color Revolutions:
http://socialistworker.org/print/2011/02/04/the-struggle-surges-ahead
This explains Uncle Sam's urgency to replace (Mu)Barak with SOMETHING ... ANYTHING ... other than the status quo - a Cairo Commune.
There can be no worse outcome for Uncle Sam and Apartheid Israel, hard as it is to take back all those guns.
They should have thought about that before they gave those billions of dollars of armaments to a country that has survived more than 2000 years.
Egypt survived as a country for 2000 years? Are you high?
So what about the British Empire, ottoman empire, the Islamic caliphate and the Roman Empire? Egypt has been a conquered province much longer than it has been a nation.
Down but never out.
Egypt = a U. S. city near you soon.
There's an odd stepping up of the troll brigade. Probably worried too many people will read zerohedge instead of watch the stuperbowl.
12 more people watched the super bowl this year compared to last. The increase has been attributed to half of the US being buried under snow and shut in.
Egypt in a little bit better shape than California. I just don't think Egypt has the chiva that the left coasters do.
Egyptians are leading, fighting for their future. Californians are being led to the slaughter (bancruptcy) by beaureaucratic thieves.
"8 billion pounds in 91-day bills yielding “not less than” 12.5 percent and 2 billion pounds in 273- day bills, yielding 14 percent."
The world of finance is so very hard to understand. American credit cards just hit a new national average good credit rating record of 14.73%.
http://www.creditcards.com/press-releases/CreditCards-Weekly-Credit-Card-Rate-Report-February-02-2011.php
im gonna start printing savagegoose bucks, you can take em as payment for anything i want to buy.
just dont expect exchange rates to hold up when you demand delivery in something other than goose bucks
Egypt who?? So last week news. Super bowl time!!!
downwiththebanks - Thx for the link!
And to think we're relying on socialists for on the ground reporting from Egypt.
RobotTrader - Bread and Circuses baby, Bread and Circuses!
Which is not to mean I don't value your input - because I value it highly.
Relying on socialists and the Arab world for our news....
do we need any more evidence that the American experiment has run into a brick wall?
Relying on socialist? What the fuck are you talking about? Corporate fascists are running the country. Nothing for the people. Agreed, however, that the US experiment has been decimated.
Uncle Sam's 'journalism' went off the rails sometime around "Remember the Maine".