Egyptian cabinet selected financial and legal advisors to manage selling a minority stake in Telecom Egypt (ETEL), according to Asharq Business.
Asharq Business reported citing unnamed sources familiar with the matter that Egypt has not yet decided on the size of the new shares that will be offered up to sale by the telecom operator. However, the stakes sale could range between 10% and 20%.
Another source added that Telecom Egypt would alternatively go for future flow securitization in US dollar if the government did not sell any stakes in it.
Currently, the government owns 80% of Telecom Egypt shares, while the remaining 20% of the company’s shares are being traded on the Egyptian Exchange (EGX). At the current price, shares, a 10% stake in Telecom Egypt is worth around EGP4.5 billion ($147 million).
The share sale comes at a time of difficulty for the Egyptian government as it suffers from a shortage of foreign reserves since the Ukrainian invasion, pushing investors to pull US$20 billion out of Egyptian treasuries.
