Minister Holds Meeting to Develop Nilex

Mahmoud Mohieldin, the Minister of Investment, held a meeting to discuss how to develop the Nile Stock Exchange (Nilex) and establish a futures exchange for various goods, products, and financial instruments.

The meeting was attended by Maged Shawky, Chairman of the Egyptian Stock Exchange, Khaled Serri Siam, and Vice-President of the Egyptian Financial Supervisory Authority (EFSA), Abdel Hamid Ibrahim, Minister of Investment's senior advisor for finance affairs, and Mohamed Omran, Vice-Chairman of the Egyptian Stock Exchange.

Dr. Mohieldin started the meeting by stressing the importance of improving the Nilex in order to help SMEs. This is not only to obtain the required funding, but to raise their efficiency and ability so that they can keep pace with all economic variables. This will significantly help the Egyptian economy grow.

The stock exchange and the bodies concerned should intensify efforts to register companies before they are placed up for sale to the public. Many direct investment funds want to increase their investments in such companies, Mohieldin added.

In this regard, Shawky reviewed the efforts made to improve this market. These efforts led to registering five companies. In addition, the EFSA licensed 23 companies within the framework of the care given to this activity.

With regards to the establishment of the futures exchange, Dr. Mohieldin stressed the importance of establishing this market because it will hedge the risk of price fluctuations, especially in lieu of the global financial crisis.

Dr. Mohieldin stressed the importance of selecting products that will be contracted, in collaboration with the other bodies concerned and the business community. He also stressed the need to intensify efforts to raise the rates of financial literacy and improve the efficiency of workers in this sector. This is important in order to deal with the rapid changes at the local and international levels.

In this regard, Serri Siam stressed that the EFSA will soon complete the legislation governing the establishment of futures exchange.