Egypt’s final IMF review moves to virtual talks with USD 2.3 bn at stake and a 15 December deadline

IN TODAY’S ISSUE: We speak to the developer behind Project Atlas, which is bidding to sell green compute to Europe. The solar-backed AI campus in New Borg El Arab is being built by Income Egypt and Dubai-based Sustainable Infra Capital. Phase one of the project, which is set to hold no Egyptian data, is due to clock in at 180 MW and would cost around USD 2.15 bn, Income’s Aly Sheta tells us, with financial close targeted for end-2027.

Speaking of power: The 900 MW Shokeir wind farm in the Gulf of Suez has reached financial close on around USD 588 mn of debt. Once it’s running, it’ll be Engie’s largest onshore wind farm anywhere. The close landed about four months after Orascom’s target, but construction has been underway since June.

On the energy front: Egyptian General Petroleum Corporation has hired Halliburton to design a 50-well fracking program in the Western Desert, going after the oil that conventional extraction approaches left behind. The Oil Ministry’s preliminary estimate is 50k-100k bbl / d of crude. For now, the plan only includes studies and design, and drilling comes if the numbers hold up.

***

SEND US A VOICE NOTE? Ever wondered how EnterpriseAM makes money, how the newsroom runs over the course of the day, from Egypt to Saudi to the UAE, or why, in the age of reels and zippy TikTok virals, we’re still betting on long-form journalism?

We’re looking for reader questions for an upcoming episode of Making It and would love to hear from you. Send your question as a WhatsApp voice note to +20 100 988 8800 or email it to us by replying to this email.

Shy? We’re happy to take written questions, too.

***

IMF talks go virtual

Talks on the final review of Egypt’s USD 8 bn extended fund facility with the IMF are moving online after the Fund’s mission to Cairo (which ran from 25 October to 5 November) wrapped without a staff-level agreement. “Important progress was made during the mission,” IMF Communications Director Julie Kozack said during a press briefing on Thursday.

Kozack gave no timeline or details on a follow-up program, saying the Fund remains focused on the current one, and that what comes next “is very much for the Egyptian authorities.” The review of the EFF and a separate resilience and sustainability facility would unlock c. USD 2.3 bn before the program expires on 15 December.

Signed, sealed, delivered

Egypt is now the first country outside Europe whose electronic signature framework is technically aligned with the EU’s, according to statements from the EU and the Information Technology Industry Development Agency (ITIDA) (pdf). The European Commission plans to add Egypt to its Third Countries List of Trusted Lists (alongside Moldova and Ukraine), which would let EU member states validate Egyptian e-signatures and seals. ITIDA is returning the favor, adding the EU’s list to Egypt’s own so that European signatures can be validated here.

Why it matters: The EU is Egypt’s largest trading partner, accounting for 24.6% of Egypt’s total trade and EUR 32.3 bn in goods trade last year, according to EU data.

Happening today

Exporters will hear how the revamped export rebate program works in practice this afternoon, when the Finance and Investment ministries brief them at a 4pm press conference at the St. Regis in the New Administrative Capital, according to an invitation EnterpriseAM received. The Cabinet approved the program earlier this month, and its new rates already cover shipments made since the start of November.

Happening tomorrow

More than 70 senior executives from global companies arrive in the New Capital tomorrow for the World Economic Forum’s Country Strategy Meeting on Egypt, which runs Monday and Tuesday, 16-17 November. President Abdel Fattah El Sisi will hold a special dialogue with the visiting CEOs while cabinet members make the case for investment. The pitch: 1.5 bn consumers reachable tariff-free through pacts including the EU Association Agreement and African Continental Freetrade Area.

PSA-

WEATHER- Cairo is back in the mid-20s today, with a high of 26°C and a low of 17°C, according to our favorite weather app.

It’s a degree warmer by day on the coast in Alexandria too, with a high of 25°C and a low of 16°C.

The big story abroad

Microsoft apologized on Friday for a global outage that cut off businesses, schools, and governments from Outlook, Teams, and other workplace tools. The company blamed “an issue during an earlier network capacity upgrade that surfaced following a recent network change,” rather than a cyberattack or anything AI-related. Microsoft said the service is showing “broad recovery and stability” and has promised a full post-incident report once a review is complete.

Airlines in the United States canceled 4.5k flights and pushed back another 4.4k yesterday, with the country still reeling from the longest nationwide flight shutdown since the 9/11 attacks, Reuters reports. A major communications breakdown on Friday led US aviation authorities to ground almost every departing flight across the country for almost five hours. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy traced the disruption to at least one new router that FAA contractor L3Harris had installed at a remote site, and is seeking USD 50 bn to modernize the country’s air traffic control systems.

Some 106k people protested across France yesterday, including 24k in Paris, according to the Interior Ministry. Demonstrators took to the streets over issues ranging from rising living costs to a proposal to give police greater legal protection. The protests were smaller than other recent demonstrations.

Setting the record straight

OLA Energy says reports that it plans to invest EGP 2 bn in 20 new integrated fuel stations in Egypt in FY 2027/28 are incorrect, according to a statement the company sent to EnterpriseAM. The Libyan-owned fuel retailer says the figures, which we noted on Thursday citing Asharq Business, did not come from the company.