Cairo – Mubasher: Foreign investments in Egypt’s debt instruments increased to $26 billion as the market started to recover from the coronavirus (COVID-19) crisis, the Minister of Finance, Mohamed Maait, said in an interview with Al Arabiya on Sunday.

The Ministry of Finance has lowered its forecast for the public debt to 89% from an earlier projection of 83% during fiscal year 2020/2021 and the primary surplus to EGP 35-40 billion from EGP 130 billion, Maait added. 

In addition, the overall budget deficit is expected to reach 7.9%, compared to a previous expectation of 6.3%.

Egypt’s economy is also seen to expand by 2.8- 4% in the year ending on 30 June.

Maait expects revenues to drop EGP 150-200 billion during the current fiscal year due to the repercussions of the pandemic.