Mohamed Omran, head of the Financial Regulatory Authority (FRA), reviewed the most important events that happened to the authority throughout the last year, including the approval of the consumer finance draft law and sending it to the parliament for discussion scheduled within two weeks. FRA also approved the compulsory car insurance draft law, and permitted financial leasing activities for microfinance companies. FRA set controls on the futures exchange in March, issued a guide for all non-banking financial activities, and amended the Microfinance Law. In June, FRA joined the International Network of Financial Centres for Sustainability and issued its first report on sustainability. The authority also completed procedures for establishing a regional centre for sustainable financing. While Egypt moved up 15 ranks in the Doing Business index. FRA issued 182 decisions in 2019, including 56 regulatory rules and 89 others regulating non-bank financial activities. Securitisation bond issuances reached 18 worth about EGP 22bn in 2019, compared to seven issuances of EGP 5.2bn in 2018. Moreover, Egypt ranked first in the Middle East in terms of venture capital deals, and the second in terms of the value of such deals. Egypt's ranking also increased 39% in the Morgan Stanley index. Non-bank financial activities, except factoring, achieved remarkable growth last year, as mortgage financing grew 18% to EGP 2.6bn, compared to EGP 2.2bn in 2018, while financial leasing achieved 34% growth, reaching EGP 56bn, compared to EGP 41.7bn in the comparison period. In addition, microfinance grew 43.5% to EGP 16.5bn in 2019, compared to EGP 11.5bn in 2018. FRA made licences available to credit rating companies for small and medium enterprises, in addition to reducing the cost of issuing green bonds by 50%.
