Egypt’s balance of payments flipped to a surplus of USD 1.9 bn in the state fiscal year ending 30 June 2021, compared with a deficit of USD 8.6 bn in the previous fiscal year, when the early days of the covid-19 pandemic wiped out tourism and slowed global trade.
“This improvement proved the ability of the Egyptian economy to quickly recover from the crises that hit the global economy,” the central bank said in a statement (pdf) released over the weekend that enclosed the figures.
Our current account deficit widened by USD 7.2 bn in the state fiscal year ending 30 June 2021, closing FY 2020-2021 at USD 18.4 bn compared with USD 11.2 bn the previous year, a fact the CBE attributed to a “noticeable drop in tourism revenues” thanks to the impact of the pandemic on tourism. (Diving a bit deeper, we think the current account deficit actually shrank from USD 5.7 bn in 3Q2020-21, likely on the back of rising remittances and portfolio investments.)
Our biggest gainer was remittances, which rose by 13.2% y-o-y in FY 2020-2021 to USD 31.4 bn, up from USD 27.8 bn the previous fiscal year. Inflows rose almost 30% to USD 8.1 bn in 4Q, up from USD 6.2 bn in the same period last year, the CBE noted last month.
