Patrick Werr is back to writing his usual column for The National and his first order of business to sound the call that Egypt “should be working overtime to attract longer-term investment.” Werr is positing, “citing fixed-income traders and economists,” that the central bank has been keeping the EGP undervalued “by as much as 20%.” He says that if the central bank allows the EGP to strengthen, the inflows of “hot money” portfolio investments to depart, “prompting foreign investors to take their profits and pull their money out of Egypt.” The government should counter this potential by attracting longer-term investment. A starting point would be for the government to stop threatening to intervene in the marketplace, Werr says. “It could also push ahead with the long-promised sale of stakes in large state companies, especially Banque du Caire, which has been repeatedly delayed. Among other reforms, government employees should be taught how to implement the country's laws … Another would be to reduce to a minimum the huge number of government entities that companies currently must deal to get start up their projects. Yet another reform would be to make it harder to punish employees who make mistakes.”

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