The National Bank of Egypt (NBE) tops the list as the best bank dealing with treasury bills and bonds. Egyptian Ministry of Finance announced on Sunday in an official statement the names of the top five banks that trade treasury bills and treasury bonds during the second quarter of the fiscal year 2013-2014. The ministerial results included the banks that topped the primary market, where the ministry sells the bonds and bills to 15 authorised banks, and the secondary market, and the banks re-sell the bonds and bills to financial institutions, insurance companies and the public. As regards the first top five in the primary market for treasury bills, the NBE came first followed by the Arab African International Bank and the Commercial International Bank (CIB) as both ranked second, Banque Misr, Barclays – Egypt and then in the fifth place Qatar National Bank (QNB ALAHLI) and Crédit Agricole –Egypt . Moreover, the primary market for Treasury bonds top-five list showed the NBE in the first place, CIB, Banque Misr, Misr Iran Development Bank, then QNB ALAHLI. The secondary market for Treasury bills list displayed Crédit Agricole – Egypt in the first place, followed by the NBE, the Bank of Alexandria, Arab African International Bank then Barclays – Egypt. The secondary market for Treasury bonds put the NBE in the first place followed by Banque Misr, Crédit Agricole – Egypt, the CIB then the Bank of Alexandria. In the statement, the Ministry of Finance said it issued this ranking classification as part of its measures to activate the government securities market and to boost its liquidity as the most important tools and mechanisms to provide the required funding meeting the general budget deficit. It further added that the commercial banks will benefit from such classifications to make prominent their competitive role in the Egyptian market in the different fields. In addition, the foreign banks operating in Egypt are very interested in these assessments as evidence of the successful management of the relevant banks. The ministry also stated that it will issue these classifications periodically in an effort to integrate Egypt in the global markets and the most important emerging markets which regularly issue classifications of their major financial market dealers. Making such classifications available, the statement noted, will encourage the Egyptian banks to play a bigger role in the development of the government securities market, which can reflect positively on the trading volumes in the market. This will increase the liquidity of government securities. The average interest rate for the general debt currently stands at about 9.87%, after tax, and the average maturity is 1.5 years.
