By Sherine Abdel-Razek The market has been clinging to an upward trend for most of the last trading sessions, with the EGX30 breaking the 5,000 points barrier again, amid a revival in the value of transactions hitting an average of LE700 million through the five sessions ending Monday, which marked the fifth consecutive session that the EGX30 ends in green. The bourse's acting chairman, Mohamed Abdel-Salam, was on a tour in the Gulf last week to promote the local market. Abdel-Salam said during the tour that the market has been faring better than expected since it resumed its activities on 23 March after a seven weeks' trading halt following the uprising. He also noted that one of the good surprises was that approximately 60 per cent of the investors, in the sessions that followed the reopening of the market, were entering the market for the first time. On the macroeconomic level, the minister of tourism, Mounir Fakhri Abdel-Nour, said that hotel reservations in many touristic areas have fallen by 15 per cent due to sectarian clashes. The tourism sector, which contributes 11.3 per cent to the national economy, has lost an estimated $2.2 billion since the 25 January Revolution, Abdel-Nour added. ORASCOM TELECOM (OTH): The company's executive chairman and business tycoon, Naguib Sawiris, stepped down leaving his position to Khaled Bichara who was OTH's chief executive. While the company's statement which revealed the news did not mention a reason for the change, the decision comes at a time where Sawiris is shifting his focus to social and political activities. Sawiris was a prominent member in the Committee of the Wise which negotiated the transition of power with former president Hosni Mubarak's regime, and he is also the founder of a new political party, the Free Egyptians. Bichara will be replaced as Orascom's CEO by Ahmed Abu Doma, the former head of OTH's Bangladeshi business. Abu Doma had also worked as the head of marketing at Orascom's Egyptian mobile venture Mobinil, the firm said in a statement. It did not give a reason for the change. Banglalink, Orascom's third-biggest unit by revenue, brought in about $457 million last year, up from about $351 million in 2009. The subsidiary has over 19 million mobile subscribers. This is not the first time that Bichara replaces Sawiris as in November 2009 he took over as the company's CEO. Russia's third-largest mobile operator VimpelCom last month closed a deal worth more than $6 billion for Sawiris's investment vehicle Wind Telecom, including majority stakes in Orascom and Italy's Wind. On another front, local press reported that both Banque Misr and UAE's Mashreq Bank will sign by the end of May the final contract of the syndicated loan for Mena Cable, a subsidiary of OTH, worth $ 82 million. The contracts are currently being revised and prepared and the Banque Misr's contribution will be in the neighbourhood of 40-60 per cent with Mashreq Bank filling in the balance. OTH will use the new facility to cover 20 per cent of the marine cable (MENA) cost for five years. The cost of the cable which links Egypt to Italy is around $400 million. EZZ DEKHEILA STEEL: Egyptian steel magnate Ahmed Ezz resigned as chairman of Ezz Dekheila Steel. Ezz has been detained since 17 February pending trial on accusations of profiteering and wasting public funds. He was charged with illegally taking control of Dekheila Steel using his strong relationship with Mubarak and his younger son Gamal. Ezz Dekheila supplies its parent company Ezz Steel with steel at reduced prices, causing Dekheila heavy losses. Ezz also faces charges of monopolising the local steel market. While analysts expected Ezz's resignation to have limited effect on the business because he was not strongly involved in day-to-day operations, investors welcomed the decision with shares in Ezz Steel rising three per cent on the day the decision was made public. Ezz Dekheila's unaudited 2010 results were unchanged from a year earlier at LE724 million while its revenues increased through the period by 21 per cent to reach LE9.86 billion. ORASCOM CONSTRUCTION INDUSTRIES (OCI): Egypt's largest listed firm expects a double- digit revenue and profit growth in 2011 and was upbeat on regional infrastructure spending, its CEO Nassef Sawiris told Reuters. "We continue to be positive on the rest of the year. Based on prices lower than what we are seeing now, we expect all our parameters to be double-digit growth from last year," he said. Protests in Egypt have delayed the launch of several public private partnership projects (PPP) which OCI had been in a strong position to snap up. However, the firm which realised more than 40 per cent of its revenue from the Middle East and North Africa in the first quarter of 2011 is upbeat on demand in Abu Dhabi, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Morocco, countries that have been resilient to the political unrest spreading in the region. OCI, which also has a big fertiliser business, made a 77 per cent increase in its net profit in the first quarter to reach $207 million thanks to higher fertiliser prices. OCI's fertiliser business sold over 1.1 million tonnes of nitrogen-based fertilisers during the quarter compared with 0.47 million during the same period last year. "We are focussed on cementing our position in the fertiliser industry to be one of the top three players in the world," Sawiris said. On the same front, OCI, through its wholly owned subsidiary OCI Nitrogen, has acquired an integrated ammonia-methanol plant located in Beaumont, Texas. The plant has a production capacity of 250,000 tonnes of ammonia and 750,000 tonnes of methanol per annum. COMMERCIAL INTERNATIONAL BANK (CIB): Egypt's biggest private bank by assets posted a 42 per cent drop in its first quarter net profits year on year to reach LE307.9 million. Egyptian banks were badly hurt by the political unrest that led to the 11 February resignation of Mubarak and that prompted the Central Bank to close banks for almost two weeks. The bank said it had placed LE123 million into provisions in line with its "conservative credit culture and in light of the current levels of uncertainty." Net loans and overdrafts to customers as of 31 March climbed to LE36.25 billion from LE35.05 billion as of the end of 2010, the bank said. "For the most part of the quarter, the core economic activities were severely disrupted as a result of massive demonstrations throughout the country, lack of security, labour demands and the imposed curfew," CIB said in a statement accompanying the results.
