{"id":633765,"date":"2024-07-21T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2024-07-21T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/enterpriseam.com\/egypt\/2024\/07\/21\/goodbye-power-cuts-until-mid-september\/"},"modified":"2024-07-21T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2024-07-21T00:00:00","slug":"goodbye-power-cuts-until-mid-september","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/enterpriseam.com\/egypt\/2024\/07\/21\/goodbye-power-cuts-until-mid-september\/","title":{"rendered":"Goodbye power cuts \u2026 until mid-September"},"content":{"rendered":"

Good morning, folks. <\/strong>We are kicking off this shortened workweek with a brisk issue led by news of the central bank keeping rates unchanged and two fintech players securing major funding. <\/p>\n

HAPPENING TODAY- <\/p>\n

<\/a> #1- <\/strong>A long break from power cuts: <\/strong>The government is halting rolling blackouts<\/a> starting today and until mid-September.<\/p>\n

But it won\u2019t come cheap:<\/strong> The cost of importing the LNG and Mazut needed to temporarily pause rolling blackouts is estimated to be around USD 1.2 bn, Al Mal<\/a> reports, citing unnamed officials from the Electricity Ministry. State gas firm EGAS has so far received<\/a> five shipments \u2014 of the 21 shipments secured \u2014 carrying 155k cubic meters of LNG. The shipments are to be regasified on one of the floating storage and regasification units Egypt has access to then fed into the national grid. <\/p>\n

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<\/a> #2- <\/strong>Another t-bill auction: <\/strong>The Central Bank of Egypt is looking to raise EGP 65 mn from auctioning off EGP-denominated treasury bills \u2014 the bills will have tenors of three and nine months, according to the bank\u2019s website. The submission deadline for the t-bills is today at 11am.<\/p>\n

HAPPENING THIS WEEK- <\/p>\n

<\/a> #1- A fuel price hike incoming?<\/strong> We\u2019re expecting the government\u2019s fuel pricing committee to announce its decision on fuel prices for the next three months this week, after concluding<\/a> its meetings last week. <\/p>\n

Remember:<\/strong> The IMF has postponed<\/a> its executive board meeting to discuss the third review of the USD 8 bn program to Egypt from 10 July to 29 July, as the fund adopts a wait-and-see approach regarding planned subsidy cuts.<\/p>\n

#2- Retail investors have until Tuesday to subscribe to the Act Financial IPO. <\/strong>Retail investors \u2014 who are being offered 60 mn shares<\/a> \u2014 can subscribe to a minimum of 1k shares and a maximum of 1.75 mn shares. The subscription period for institutional investors wrapped up on Thursday. <\/p>\n

High demand from institutional investors<\/strong>, whose offering was 20.2x oversubscribed \u2014 the highest demand a subscription period has seen in six years, an informed source told Enterprise. <\/p>\n

ICYMI- <\/strong>The company is offering some 32% of the company<\/a> \u2014 360 mn shares \u2014 in the first IPO the EGX has seen in a year. The shares are being offered at a price of EGP 2.90 a pop, with the company aiming to raise around EGP 1.04 bn through the offering.<\/p>\n

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<\/a> Vote of confidence from the House: <\/strong>The House general assembly voted in favor<\/a> of the new Madbouly government\u2019s policy for its three-year term on Thursday. This came only days after the ad hoc committee reviewing the new cabinet\u2019s policy unanimously approved<\/a> it. <\/p>\n

About the policy: <\/strong>The plan, which Prime Minister Moustafa Madbouly presented to the House<\/a>earlier this month<\/a>, breaks down the new government\u2019s plans into four simple goals \u2014 protecting national security and Egypt\u2019s foreign policy, building up the Egyptian citizen, building a competitive economy that attracts investments, and achieving political stability.<\/p>\n

Want the nitty gritty? <\/strong>We already dove into the economic<\/a>, green<\/a>, and infrastructure<\/a> aspects of the new cabinet\u2019s plan.<\/p>\n

PSA- <\/p>\n

We have another long weekend coming up: <\/strong>Public and private sector workers will have Thursday, 25 July off in observance of the 23 July Revolution.<\/p>\n

WEATHER- <\/strong>It\u2019s another hot day in Cairo, with a high of 39\u00b0C and a low of 28\u00b0C, according to our favorite weather app.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s almost as hot in Alexandria either<\/strong>, with a high of 35\u00b0C and a low of 25\u00b0C.<\/p>\n

** DID YOU KNOW that we now cover <\/strong>Saudi Arabia<\/a><\/strong> and the <\/strong>UAE<\/a><\/strong>?<\/strong><\/p>\n

DATA POINT-<\/p>\n

<\/a> A record year for the<\/strong> SCZone: <\/strong>The Suez Canal Economic Zone (SCZone) saw its revenues grow 36% y-o-y to hit a record EGP 8.3 bn during the fiscal year 2023-2024, according to a SCZone statement<\/a>. <\/p>\n

THE BIG STORY ABROAD- <\/p>\n

Days later, the world\u2019s biggest IT failure is still making headlines. <\/strong>Many services around the world were upended over the weekend by a global tech failure<\/a> that, while mercifully sparing most of us here in Egypt, caused vast disruptions to travel and business activity worldwide.<\/p>\n

Blue Screens Of Death for everyone: <\/strong>A routine software update pushed by global cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike<\/a> to its Falcon Sensor software threw some 8.5 mn machines running Microsoft Windows into boot loops. Airlines and some other companies were particularly hard-hit: Microsoft\u2019s Azure platform went down for some<\/a> late on Thursday.<\/p>\n

The irony: <\/strong>CrowdStrike bills itself as the fastest way for IT pros to detect threats to their infrastructure. It serves more than 29k major global companies and institutions, including more than half of the Fortune 1000. <\/p>\n

Who was impacted: <\/strong>Many airports and airlines around the world grounded flights and did manual paperwork. Some broadcasters were off air, hospitals canceled procedures, and banking services were offline in many countries, Bloomberg reports<\/a>. Emergency services were also hit in some countries. <\/p>\n

Y2K redux:<\/strong> The tech failure is now being described as one of the biggest tech failures ever<\/a> and is raising questions<\/a> about the fragility of the world\u2019s fundamental IT architecture. \u201cThis is basically what we were worried about with Y2K,\u201d cybersecurity expert Troy Hunt wrote in an X<\/a> post Friday, \u201cexcept it\u2019s actually happened this time.\u201d<\/p>\n

The status now: <\/strong>Things are starting to unsnarl as technicians push out fixes, Reuters<\/a> notes. Windows users who have been impacted have to reboot their machines and manually delete CrowdStrike\u2019s botched update \u2014 a process that requires hands-on access to each device, according to Financial Times<\/a>. It\u2019s a process that could take days for businesses with large fleets of impacted devices and not enough IT staff, experts told FT.<\/p>\n

REGIONALLY-<\/strong> the failure impacted<\/a> some electronic systems in the UAE and had a limited impact on flight operations.<\/p>\n

MEANWHILE- Calls for Joe Biden to bow out of the US presidential race continue to <\/strong>gather steam <\/strong>as the octogenarian candidate remains publicly defiant<\/a> in the face of media and party skepticism. Leaks in and out of Washington \u2014 including reports<\/a> that former president Barack Obama is now calling into question Biden\u2019s ability to win in November \u2014 reflect the Democratic Party\u2019s increasing concern with Biden\u2019s candidacy.<\/p>\n

What happens next? <\/strong>It\u2019s anyone\u2019s guess, but the New York Times suggests<\/a> that:<\/p>\n