The Egyptian Exchange (EGX) has opened Thursday's session incurring losses of EGP 732 million driven by the economic chaos the country is witnessing alongside the initial approval of the stamp taxes on the bourse's daily buying and selling transactions. The capital market has amounted to EGP 345.217 billion, according to data compiled by Amwal Al Ghad English at 11:04 a.m. Cairo time (09:04 GMT) during Thursday's opening session. The EGX indices opened in red notes, except for the benchmark, which recorded 4-month low on Wednesday closing, slightly went up during the opening. Benchmark EGX30 rose by 0.02% to 4927.43 p; while EGX20 fell by 0.13% to 5690.8 p. Meanwhile, the mid- and small-cap index, the EGX70 went down by 0.31% to 430.32 p. Price index EGX100 dipped by 0.12% to 718.21 p. Egypt's upper house has initially endorsed Wednesday afternoon the government's proposal to impose stamp tax on EGX's daily transactions. During Thursday's opening session, the trading volume has reached 13.109 million securities worth EGP 14.460 million, exchanged through 1.201 transactions. This was after trading in 74 listed securities; 27 declined, 11 advanced; while 36 keeping their previous levels. Egyptians selling pressures have driven EGX's opening losses as they were net sellers seizing 82.82% of the total markets, with a net equity of EGP 2.764 million excluding the deals. Meanwhile, Arabs and non-Arab foreigners' were net buyers seizing 9.56% and 7.62% respectively, of the total markets, with a net equity of EGP 2.122 million and EGP 642.095 thousand, excluding the deals.
