The IMF and Egypt have agreed to a $5.2bn, 12-month, Stand-By Arrangement (SBA), just a few weeks after Cairo accessed $2.77bn from the fund’s rapid financing instrument (RFI), as it tries to cope with the economic impact of the coronavirus pandemic.

Barely 12 months after emerging from an ambitious $12bn, three-year program with the IMF which overhauled the country’s ailing economy, Cairo has turned to the fund again, with its international reserves falling to a near three-year low of $36.0bn at end May (see chart). (CONTINUED - 821 WORDS)