Arab Finance: President Abel Fattah El-Sisi approved a proposal to issue tax sukuk financed by taxpayers, as they will be deducted from their future tax liabilities, Spokesman for the Presidency Mohamed El-Shennawy announced.
Offering an attractive and suitable yield, these certificates will help reduce the government’s financing needs and lower debt-servicing costs.
Moreover, El-Sisi stressed the need to develop the tax system, enhance all tax services, introduce further facilitation measures, and strengthen investor confidence. He also ordered the launch of the third package of tax facilitation measures.
This was announced at a meeting with Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly and Minister of Finance Ahmed Kouchouk, during which the president was briefed on the latest developments in implementing the real estate tax facilitation package.
The package includes the launch of a mobile application for the first time, along with measures to simplify procedures and make the service easier to use.
Kouchouk added that a similar application and system dedicated to the real estate disposal tax will be launched in the coming days.
The minister also reviewed the financial performance for fiscal year (FY) 2025/2026, including the key financial and economic indicators included in the state budget.
He noted that Egypt’s real gross domestic product (GDP) growth rate hit 5.2% during the first nine months of FY2025/2026. This is in addition to several positive indicators, such as a decline in the external debt of budget entities, a broadening tax base driven by simplified and automated procedures, and higher non-tax revenues.
Likewise, performance of financial markets and the Egyptian Exchange (EGX) advanced, alongside a notable decline in the cost of insuring against sovereign default risk and an improvement in yields on Egyptian government bonds.
The meeting also reviewed developments in the debt indicators of budget entities, as the government successfully reduced the budget entity debt as a percentage of GDP by 13.2% over the past two years.
