Cairo

This is not at all a recommendation to buy, quite the contrary, the book is an alarmingly disappointing read. Intrigued to buy by the fact that events unfold in our beloved Cairo only to discover that Somerville has spun the tale to unsuspecting readers such that Cairo is an “exotic” and dangerous primitive place with desert and villages and tribal gangs.

Yet among page after page of cliché and a less than charming attempt at an action packed adventure, were a couple of paragraphs I felt worthy of sharing with you. Kindly don’t interpret this as a book recommendation, I wholeheartedly regret the purchase.

“Cairo was on the surface a city of filth, chaos and ruins. But to those who were able to sink in to, Cairo was Al Kahira – The Triumphant, teeming with people, ebullient, enveloped in the past, kinetic, yielding, collapsing and constantly rebuilding itself out of the debris”.

His description of driving in Cairo hits too close to home not to share, it was the only part of the book where he had me smiling of a whole page

Farouk drove his car as if the brakes had not only failed but long ago been ripped from the vehicle and replaced with only a horn. His response to all oncoming obstacles – camels, schoolchildren, bicycles, donkey carts, the infirm hobbling across the road – was to accelerate towards them, honking and cursing, merciless in his impatience. But he would demonstrate monk-like tranquillity behind trucks blocking narrow streets or with leisurely workers smoking and slowly moving split-bamboo cages containing chickens or piles of bricks.

The greatest enemy of all was that many-headed monster the Other Driver, with his murderous incompetence, psychotic competitiveness and profound visual impairment. Such cars were passed with unceasing incantations. In case of extreme provocation there was an escalating scale of response. Driving past and staring like a wrathful Hindu God was the least severe. Throwing both hands heavenward was the next level. The most serious and frequent reprisal was to wind down the window and articulate the anatomy of the offending driver’s mother. It was always the absent mothers who took the punishment. Fin wondered if, on some subtle level, they were actually responsible.

The Economics of Life

My TEDx day-view

I am indebted to the organising team for their passion and the attendees at the BA for making my day in my city by the sea unforgettable. Your individual feedback was heart warming and extremely touching.

For those interested in the actual slides, they are downloadable here: The Economics of Life – Inji Amr

 

 

 

 

 

 

Economic Awareness Videos

Ever since I’d seen the Crisis of Credit awareness video & I have been obsessing about & dreaming of doing a series of similar videos in Arabic explaining economic concepts to the non-economists & making the newspaper headlines relevant to the average citizen. I’ve been in the search for a cooperative & collaborative cartoonist for quite some time. At the end an awesome young man, the 14 year old son of a good friend offered to do it. The video below is our very first attempt. This was done much earlier this Summer but it had taken me this long to get around to uploading it as there was a chance it would be day-viewed at the last TEDxAlexandriaU. Hence, I apologise if it comes across as untimely given the current state of the stock market.

I am uploading this pilot for feedback. Ahmed & I would love your feedback on content, ease of understanding, language, audio speed, visuals, animation etc. Basically any kind of feedback you throw our way would be HIGHLY appreciated.

Thanks.

P.S. I would like to commend the awesome work being done by the Qabila team, more so that their work is now starting to take on a socio-economic flavour.

Ahmed Said, your energy & professionalism far exceed most adults I know & it is your effort & dedication that made this possible

Need Your Opinion

For those of you who have been frequenting this peace of cyber space for quite some time now, or those of you whom have read my book:

How would you feel about a book that is a collection of small stories, blog post style, some from here on the blog & some others from an actual notebook? Would such a book be worth buying in your opinion? Favourite short stories from the blog?

Thanks a million.

The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo

You know your job is taking over your brain when the most memorable quote from a murder mystery is one about the economy. Here you go:

The idea that Sweden’s economy is headed for a crash is nonsense. . . .You have to distinguish between two things–the Swedish economy and the Swedish stock market. The Swedish economy is the sum of all the goods and services that are produced in this country every day. There are telephones from Ericsson, cars from Volvo, chickens from Scan, and shipments from Kiruna to Skovde. That’s the Swedish economy, and it’s just as strong or weak today as it was a week ago. . . .The Stock Exchange is something very different. There is no economy and no production of goods and services. There are only fantasies in which people form one hour to the next decide that this or that company is worth so many billions, more or less. It doesn’t have a thing to do with reality or with the Swedish economy. . . .It only means that a bunch of heavy speculators are now moving their shareholdings from Swedish companies to German ones. So it’s the financial gnomes that some tough reporter should identify and expose as traitors. They’re the ones who are systematically and perhaps deliberately damaging the Swedish economy in order to satisfy the profit interests of their clients.”

I’ve been screaming the same about our economy, couldn’t believe when I saw the views in print. Good book overall, quite the entertaining read.

Revised Egypt 2011/ 2012 budget

MOF has issued a powerpoint summary of the revised Egypt 2011/2012 budget. You can go through it here.

Meanwhile, blog post deferred till I can update the presentation to reflect changes in the budget.

The Million Dollar Question

So the twitter timeline yesterday and my budget awareness session the day before were filled with one question.

Where do the Suez Canal revenues go?

They don’t appear anywhere on the budget. So I took the question to the Ministry of Finance. Their responses are as follows:

Suez canal revenues are balance of payments revenues, they are not recorded in the budget as they are national revenues rather than government revenues. Taxes on these revenues on the other hand do enter the budget and appear in it. Natural gas exports (and all exports for that matter) will also be recorded in the balance of payments and not the budget. Finally, all public sector enterprises and their budgets are by definition off-budget & will not appear in the 2011/2012 budget.

Ok boys and girls, hope this answers the collective curiosity, albeit I bet all of you are still wondering what the Suez canal revenues get spent on and who’s pocket they end up in.

Government Budget Awareness Session

To whom it may concern, I’m giving an economic awareness session on Sunday the 26th at Tahrir Lounge (5 El Bostan Street, Goethe building downtown) at 6 pm.

The session is entitled “Egyptian government budget, jargon, values and possible implications”.

Session is targeting the non-economists and will basically be an introduction to the concept of budgeting, the various items and highlighting interesting choices in the last MOF budget proposal.

Session will be given in Arabic.

Teenage Dream

Last Saturday I had the privilege of being invited to speak at the Deutshce Schule Der Boromaerinnen (Dsb) (German School in Bab El Louk). I had originally come in to talk to the graduating class during their English class about my book and the experience of getting published. We ended up rescheduling a lot and instead that class had finals that day and I got to meet some younger and extremely charming young ladies aged 14-17.

As they came in and filled the hall, I stood there leaning on the Yamaha grand piano and wondering if anything I could say would capture their attention for longer than 30 seconds. Yet there we were minutes later joking around, talking about books, movies, my novel, getting published, time management, hobbies, music, career choices, bucket lists and pipe dreams.

The conversation steered itself towards their concern on their ability or preparation to choose majors, universities, and potential careers. It is perfectly normal to not know what you want to do with your life at their age. Yet this wasn’t what concerned me, they were not lost, they were scared. Their collective level of anxiety was so high it was tangible. They had a fear of tomorrow, a fear of the unknown, a fear of having to be responsible, a fear of accountability, a fear of having to fend for themselves and make their own decisions. They had been in such a high pressure high discipline environment for so long, they feared what would happen once that frame of support and stress was no longer there.

We found ourselves debating the merits of a European education. Whether there is such a thing as too much discipline. Whether students in German, French or British schools were oppressed by the rigidity of the system, robbed of their individuality. Comparing it to the creativity and individuality embracing American educational system that is a lot more lax.

Yet there they were, young, motivated, their entire lives yet before them, and instead of embracing that fact they were panicking about the thought that what they believed were the best, easiest and safest years of their lives were soon to be behind them. It saddened me greatly. A regiment aimed at preparing them for the world rendered them instead too insecure to venture out into it. I hope that changes in the near future. May their teenage dreams burn stronger and brighter and may they find joy in taking risks, working hard, living life and realising those dreams.

I Quote Yet I Disagree

All parents damage their children. It cannot be helped. Youth, like pristine glass, absorbs the prints of its handlers. Some parents smudge, others crack, a few shatter childhoods completely into jagged little pieces beyond repair.

Mitch Albom, The Five People You Meet in Heaven

So far, highly over-rated. Hope it improves soon.

Jan 25 Told In Song

I’ve FBed it, tweeted it and blasted it in my own car stereo and those of friends. Only thing remaining is blogging it, so here it is, lyrics and all

غنائية يوم ما الشعب إتغير

غناء فاطمة سعيد
موسيقى مصطفى الحلوانى
كلمات مصطفي أبوجمرة

كنا بنشوف الطريق مفيهوش طريق
و السما فوقنا رصاصى والامل ميت غريق
كنا فاقدين الهوية والحياة زي الممات
كنا ساكتين كلنا جوا السكات
كنا و كان و ده زمان

و في صبح اخضر ملوش مثيل
لما التقينا فى ميدانها الأسمر الاصيل
لما اتفاجئنا اننا بنحب بعض
و نموت لبعض
يومها الهلال حضن الصليب
يوم ما اشتعل فينا اللهيب
و كان اللى كان

يومها ألشعب اتغير
فك لسانه و اصبح سيد
يومها خرجنا نقول مش نافع
إحنا الشعب المصرى و صوتنا الطالع

يومها انطلقت ثورة فى مصر
ثورة تحرر ثورة تقرر ثورة تعيد ترتيب القصر
شعبنا واقف يرفض يسقط يطرد

قطعوا جميع الاتصالات
غموا عيون الفضائيات
حطوا السم فى قلب الزاد
يومها العالم صلى و شافنا
بنقبض علي دبحنا و علي سرقنا
و علي كدب فى بيان القصر
ثورة ثورة حتى النصر
ثورة فى كل شوارع مصر

بدم ولادها النازف اخضر
عزم شبابها الوقف صامد واحد راصد ماجد حالف
حالف لازم ينقذ مصر

و يومها العالم سقف واقف
والنيل زغرد عارف
ان خلاص الديب استسلم
وان الشرفا و روح الشهدا
حيملوا القصر
تحيا مصر

Egypt 2011/2012 Budget

So Zeinboia gives me the heads up about an invitation from the ministry of finance to discuss the new budget proposal with Dr. Samir Radwan and his advisers. Apparently invitation was made to some of the youth coalitions and some of the twitter economists. I had whined on twitter all morning about wanting to attend and has lost all hope, then an hour before the event the perpetually awesome TravellerW comes to the rescue and my name is at the door.

I race through Cairo traffic to the IDSC building downtown. Naturally, anything that can go wrong goes wrong, cabbie gets lost, doesn’t have change and to top it all off we get into an accident on El Kasr El3einy street and he can’t continue. I walk the remainder of the way and arrive 30 minutes late only to discover that his excellency has even worse timing than I and we end up waiting for him for another 30 minutes.

Meeting is attended by Dr. Radwan, his deputy for international relations, the deputy director for Al Ahram Center for Political & Strategic Studies (I’m not positive of his reason for being there, yet he acted like an advisor to the minister would), five IMF representatives, two of which were Egyptian, and us youth (word used VERY loosely).

While I must say, I LOVE the initiative, the format needs major tweaking, I don’t feel the group was representative of the nation at large at all, nor were most of those attending experts on the issues. Also the way the discussions were conducted lacked any sort of organisation. Why the IMF was privy to the discussions is also beyond me.

Dr. Samir opens by telling us that this draft is currently being discussed with all the different groups, that he’d met the business community earlier that day and that all views will be looked into and possibly incorporated and that the final budget should be issued by Monday. He goes on to say:

that in the absence of a people’s assembly the budget approval will be obtained from the SCAF.

He then takes us through the document outlining how he sees it, this goes on for 30 minutes. He stresses income & wages, converting fiscal policy into a tool to guarantee social justice and continuity as his three main pillars and focus areas. He then talked in depth about his plans to reform the public wage structure, his plans to centralise all SME support in a new entity which will also manage a 200 million US$ Saudi Arabia grant, and finally his plans for reforming the taxation structure in Egypt.

I will not bore you with the details cause it would serve you well to go through the document which they’ve been kind enough to share on the ministry website and which I’ve linked to in the previous paragraph. Instead I will highlight some areas some of the attendees and I found troubling. Worth noting, if you are expecting his responses you are in to for a disappointment. You see, he HEARD us, he took notes, he nodded and made jokes when appropriate, yet he then rushed off to another meeting thanking us for our time.

• TravellerW made a very valid point regarding the new tax bracket, an extra 5% will be charged to all those earning more than 10 million LE a year, sounds fair, no? Only it applies to both individuals and corporates, so basically a large group of medium sized corporates will be attached to another object by an inclined plane, wrapped helically around an axis (BBT reference).

• A renewable energy engineer pointed out that the budget is built on a very unrealistic assumption that a barrel of oil will cost $100.

• Budget has 2 billion LE allocated to training youth. When pushed for clarification Dr. Samir says that the plan is to have corporates agree to take them on for on-the-job training for 6 months during which the Ministry of Finance will pay their salaries from that 2 billion LE fund, with the hope that at the end of 6 months the corporates will hire them. Not only do I think this is a bad plan, I think it is naively optimistic and lacks long term vision. I actually asked him to kindly stop crowding out the NGOs and civil society and step up and do what only the government can do. Rather than train, leave the training to us and you instead focus on job creation, invest in projects and hire those individuals.

• Budget proposal has a very vague item regarding upping the investments in the field of R&D. I would have preferred to see some sort of incentive scheme to drive the private sector to innovate, I’m sceptic of the fact that pumping funds into government R&D will change much. I say this because I’ve seen brilliant ideas get completely shelved at the National Research Institute because those heading it don’t see the business viability of these ideas.

• Education and health spending grew at below the average growth of budget spending. Spending on education in the new budget is only 11% and the spending on health is only 5%.

• 13.5 billion LE have been earmarked to EGPC (Egyptian General Petroleum Corporation) (which for some reason suddenly has no web presence) for restructuring purposes to assist it in reform efforts. This is alarming to say the least. EGPC is a money making establishment and one of the government’s most prominent revenue centres. It is also an inefficient institution, so as attendees pointed out, wouldn’t it be better to reform it first rather than toss money at it. Especially that the opportunity cost of these funds is extremely high right now. Dr. Samir’s explanation was that these funds are going to ensure that no shortage in Solar and Butane gas occur, yet this contradicts with another item 2 pages down regarding increasing subsidies to oil products by 31.3 billion pounds.

• Attendees asked repeatedly about the 63 billion in special funds or private funds صناديق خاصة but we were given a roundabout answer and didn’t come out with much.

I also couldn’t resist the opportunity to complain about how difficult the government is making the lives of those working in the micro-finance field in Egypt. Some of those attending pitched in and even suggested dismantling the SFD all together. Enough with the rosy plans and the technical assistance, SMEs need better access to finance, it is that simple, please do something about it.

Also made it a point to stress that if we stand any chance to attract any investment for those PPP projects the Ministry of Finance is pitching, they’ll have to do a much better job of studying these projects and providing investors with real and tangible indicators to assist them in making the investment decision. It is hilarious really, projects have no declared return on investment nor payback periods for that matter.

All in all, while I appreciate the initiative, I really think he should have taken more time to answer the questions and more thought needs to be put into that budget.

Sweet Mornings

Feeling a bit nostalgic, once upon a time, whenever I was down, a friend would read me some Nizar on the phone in an attempt to alleviate the mood.

This is one of my favourites, given how early I’m always up on a weekend and in solidarity with all of you who also managed to lose precious sleep, a sweet sweet morning

صباحك سكر

إذا مر يومٌ ولم أتذكر

به أن أقول: صباحك سكر…

ورحت أخط كطفلٍ صغير

كلاماً غريباً على وجه دفتر

فلا تضجري من ذهولي وصمتي

ولا تحسبي أن شيئاً تغير

فحين أنا لا أقول: أحب..

فمعناه أني أحبك أكثر.

إذا جئتني ذات يوم بثوبٍ

كعشب البحيرات.. أخضر .. أخضر

وشعرك ملقىً على كتفيك

كبحرٍ.. كأبعاد ليلٍ مبعثر..

ونهدك.. تحت ارتفاف القميص

شهي.. شهي.. كطعنة خنجر

ورحت أعب دخاني بعمقٍ

وأرشف حبر دواتي وأسكر

فلا تنعتيني بموت الشعور

ولا تحسبي أن قلبي تحجر

فبالوهم أخلق منك إلهاً

وأجعل نهدك.. قطعة جوهر

وبالوهم.. أزرع شعرك دفلى

وقمحاً.. ولوزاً.. وغابات زعتر..

إذا ما جلست طويلاً أمامي

كمملكةٍ من عبيرٍ ومرمر..

وأغمضت عن طيباتك عيني

وأهملت شكوى القميص المعطر

فلا تحسبي أنني لا أراك

فبعض المواضيع بالذهن يبصر

ففي الظل يغدو لعطرك صوتٌ

وتصبح أبعاد عينيك أكبر

أحبك فوق المحبة.. لكن

دعيني أراك كما أتصور..

نزار قباني

Egyptian Economy : What I would do

I’ve been asked to offer my 2 cents quite a bit, so here, all my cents in one post. I am not claiming there is an absolute truth when it comes to economics, yet this post is about what I would do if I were calling the shots to steer this economy to a safe harbour.

• Ease of Doing Business: The economy is going through a tough time, fresh graduates can’t find a job, several of the really big businessmen are in jail or are facing the danger of being jailed, companies are downsizing and cutting costs to stay afloat. In this environment opportunities get born and the brave and entrepreneurial aim to capitalise on these opportunities. Yet the current legislative and regulatory environment makes their life hell. So if I were the policy maker I would make starting a business the easiest thing on the planet, slash down the time required to 24 hours and cut all the unnecessary red tape. Objective is to encourage people to do business, to generate output and to create employment. Moreover, those starting a business are doing it in unstable times, so whatever incentives you can throw their way would go a long way.

• Trials: You don’t quite follow why there is still so much dissatisfaction in the Egyptian streets? It is because Egyptians don’t feel vindicated, they feel trials are being dragged out and retribution is not swift. Those in charge should expedite these trials, repossess all unlawful and illegal gains (with interest); take back lands, operating licenses, factories, cash and whatever else was extorted or obtained through abuse of power. Then, let all those who have been steam-rolled over the years have a shot at taking them to the cleaners, install a speedy system by which they could be sued and let justice take its course.

• Attract investments: A couple of months ago a guest at CAC asked me why we were focusing so much on the fear of driving away investments when Lebanon was doing just great despite all the unrest. CNN Ben was quick to point out that most FDI flowing into Lebanon came from Lebanese origins and all the entrepreneurial Lebanese around the globe. Yet fact remains, we stand a shot at attracting FDI amongst all this madness. The trick is to stop dividing internally and show a united front. If I were the policy maker I would start selling licenses, the right to operate here in Egypt, especially in areas that in the past were monopolised either by the government or by some of the names in Porto Torah. I would give foreign investors a shot at buying a license to operate and offer private sector transport and logistics within Egypt. Imagine a second railway service, a private sector bus company, and privately designed and operated cargo ports.

• Cost of funds: Interest rates in Egypt are on the rise, while as a depositor that is great news (despite the fact that it still a good solid 2% lower than inflation so the value of my money is still declining), it does not sound too promising to investors. The cost of funds is an integral part of the investment decision. Steps should be taken to reduce the cost of funds and to improve the access to finance to enable businesses in Egypt to operate smoothly and to enjoy enhanced liquidity.

• Food safety: We are down around 8 billion dollars in foreign reserves and doomsday sayers will have you believe we are rapidly running out and soon won’t have enough reserves to cover our imports of basic necessities. That may well be true, but rather than zone in on that fact, efforts should be orchestrated and directed towards achieving some sort of internal independence with regard to food. Or, in the short-term, get foreign assistance in the form of supplies that will last the season until we can re-plan our approach to agriculture.

• Prioritize policies: I can say this one with a great deal of personal interest and passion vested into it. For the past couple of months I’ve dreamed of having the likes of www.kiva.org operate in Egypt. Yet this dream has been made difficult by the strict (and sometimes excessively rigid) money laundering regulations and restrictions on transfer of funds. So I can’t help but wonder, what is more important at this particular moment in time? Potential money laundering versus potential inflow of funds to finance SMEs around the republic. This is one example, I’m sure there are others which are hindering a speedier economic recovery.

• Wages: If enforcing a minimum wage is proving that difficult, a maximum wage should level the playing field a bit. As in this case the person making the measly wage will be relatively better off as the gap is bridged. I would take the time to revise all public sector and government wages and salaries (whether formal government contracts or under the table OUDA ones). I would slash down the ridiculous ones to meet the maximum wage criteria and I would channel those excess funds to better uses. Moreover, I would do all of this with a great deal of transparency.

• Transparency: I would extend that transparency to all aspects of government economic policy in the coming period. I belive we have had enough “constructive ambiguity”, some old-fashioned constructive clarity would be nice. The people should get a say regarding the tax structure, the government budget and how any incoming aid money should be spent. A say we get through the People’s Assembly, yet a say we only get if information stops being asymmetric and we all have a fair chance of knowing where things stand.

Then again, that’s just me.

AYB – Association For Sustainable Development

Following the Jan 25th revolution and the explosion of civil society initiatives and social activism, I have taken a personal interest in improving the information availability and transparency in the market regarding operational NGOs and initiatives. To this end, this blog post is the first of a series of posts shedding light on successful existing initiatives and NGOs that you may opt to join rather than re-invent the wheel whenever possible.

Alashanek Ya Balady (AYB) started out as a student initiative at the AUC in 2002. Raghda El Ibrashi, the founder, even at that young age, recognized the need for real development rather than charity. AYB grew inside the university, and two years later they obtained the license to open branches in other universities around the nation through a franchise model. To date they have branches in 15 universities around Egypt. In 2005 AYB was institutionalized as an NGO.

Recognizing unemployment as the greatest ailment of Egypt, and as one of the key causes of poverty and slow growth, AYB’s main area of focus has been economic development. Their model has two tracks, the formal employment track and the entrepreneurial track. Their strategy has been developed over the years and fueled by statistics about the real needs of the market. For example, according to the Egypt 2010 Human Development Report “over a third (36%) of youth aged 18 to 29 have been tracked into vocational and technical secondary schools. This group does not usually join higher education institutions and suffices with technical secondary completion certificates.” Moreover, most of those unemployed are living below the poverty line. At the current unemployment ratios and a labour force of around 26 million, the dependency rate is 4:1 (4 unemployed to every working member of the labour force). Ninety per cent of those unemployed are youth.

Accordingly, AYB are targeting youth in poor areas and those who are without higher degrees. Beneficiaries of AYB programs can be divided into two groups. The first group consists of those who can be trained and rehabilitated to join formal employment. The second group consists of people with almost no educational background, who nevertheless have promising entrepreneurial skills.

In the first track AYB bridges the gap between a person’s current skill set and the required skill set. They provide specialized training programs tailored to each industry and job, and aims at improving the job skills and job knowledge of the candidates. Their target is to help those individuals find employment at established institutions and ensure they earn a fair wage. This is done in partnership with a growing list of local and multinational players.

In the second track, AYB assists individuals through a micro-lending and technical assistance setup. Interested applicants are required to prepare a feasibility study and be ready to manage the project. Loan brackets are either from 350 to 2500 LE (Egyptian Pounds) or 3000 to 10000 LE. AYB finances these micro-entrepreneurs and consults them throughout the loan period (10 to 12 months).

AYB specializes in the following loan types:
• Manufacturing loan (e.g. mechanic, carpets).
• Productive loan (e.g. dairy and breeding).
• Consumer goods (e.g. maintenance services, mini-marts or specialized retailers).
• Agricultural products (e.g. farming and agro-industries).

The loan cycle is portrayed in the diagram below:

If you find the work of AYB interesting, there are various areas where you can volunteer. You can donate money to the funding pool for micro-loans. Or, if you have the time and technical expertise to spare, you can volunteer your assistance in project consultancy and/or provide training. Another method by which you could pitch in would be to ask the HR at the company you work with to announce their recruiting needs: your employer could become a candidate for those graduating from AYB’s first track. You could also volunteer your time in the actual NGO – AYB prides itself on being a youth organization and always welcomes the contribution of young enthusiastic individuals.

You can read more about AYB, their initiatives and their success stories at http://www.ayb-sd.org/

This post was originally featured on the Goethe Institut Li-lak Transit blog

Check it out here http://blog.goethe.de/transit/index.php?user_language=en

Masterclass Photography

My friend, the beautiful and incredibly talented Amy El Shaarawy has entered the MaCallan Masterclass Photography Competition. Her five amazing shots could use your votes and support.

Check them out here, start with that photo and click on the right arrow to view the other four.

Harassmap

For those of you interested in awareness and gender issues, there is a Harassmap team brainstorming session this Saturday.

The organising team is honoured to invite you for a meeting at Rebecca Chiao’s place next Saturday 26th of March 2011. The meeting agenda will include discussing marketing strategies for Harassmap, new slogans & new approach…etc.

Attending will be highly appreciated in order to brainstorm and come up with new & unique ideas that would help us to reach our target audience in the current phase.

Anyone interested in helping is welcome to attend.

The meeting will be at 1pm at the 4th, Osman Ebn Affan street, off Geziret El-Arab st. the last floor.

Looking forward seeing you next Saturday.

Stock Market Kaman we Kaman

For those of you adamant on investing in the stock market, some words of advise from one of the most prestigious economics and financial economics professors at the AUC. (I don’t have explicit permission to cite her name, so out of respect opting to maintain her anonymity).

While she agrees that at the end this is a symbolic gesture that serves more to foster the feeling of patriotism and solidarity than to actually have an economic impact, yet she had some guidelines to share:

• If you are going to invest do it through a credible channel.
• Don’t attempt to pick the stocks yourself.
• Invest through a fund, select one managed by a reputable institution.
• Contemplate purchasing bonds سندات or treasury bills أذون خزانة these are primary market borrowing tools that corporates and governments use to raise funds. These funds go directly to the company in question or to the Egyptian government.
• If you are going to be selecting the stocks yourself, do so based on fundamental rather than technical analysis. Enter as a long term investor and hence be more interested in the profitability of the company than the volatility of the stock.

Best of luck to you all.

The Thing That Irritates Me Above All Others

is when people don’t respect my time. It is one thing for you to have no regard for your own time. Yet to disrespect mine is a very grave offence in my book, to disrespect my time is to disrespect me. It carries the implicit assumption that I have nothing better to do in my life than to wait on you to show up or not show up at all. Don’t get me wrong, I have no delusions about punctuality in Cairo yet if you are going to be late or decide to pull a Houdini at least have the courtesy and the common sense to call or text. I understand that things come up and emergencies happen, yet all I’m asking for is a LITTLE courtesy, some respect. Even more frustrating is when people decide not to show and not to call and offer any sort of explanation, like it’s all good and its all to be expected and normal.

Just the other day a friend calls, I’m out, tells me she has something she really needs to take my opinion on and asks me when I’ll be home. Worried I actually do head home. I call her to tell her I’m home she says that’s perfect, she’s in the area and will be arriving shortly. 4 hours later I’ve still not heard from her. I sms her asking what’s up, no response. Have not heard from her since last Saturday and I know she’s alive and kicking cause common friends spoke to her on Sunday. But really?! Four freaking hours and not even a text apologising for the no-show.

Karim Abadir on the Egyptian Economy

The article below was written by Professor Karim Abadir. I find his view interesting albeit excessively optimistic. I am sharing the article for your reference as I will soon be posting  a Q&A discussion between me and him about it. Cheers.

Any revolution is bound to have an impact on the country where it happens, and often beyond its borders. But not all economies are identical and there is no single format that can be used to assess the impacts of such momentous events. I am writing this piece about the near-term impact that the Egyptian revolution will have on the economy. One of the arguments I will use needs stressing: the well-known vulnerabilities of the Egyptian economy will actually work in its favour in the case of the current revolution, vulnerabilities such as excess reliance on tourism, on output from natural resources such as oil, etc. In this article, I am focusing on the near-term impact and refraining from looking further into the future. There are more gains to be made later with changes in economic policy, but they are not for this article.

Before I proceed, we need to draw a distinction between national income accounts and a “balance sheet” that measures the stock of wealth if ever a robust measure of this existed. Current income is undoubtedly going to be lower now, because of the reduced economic activity. But this is normal: the bad UK weather this December brought its economy to a standstill and turned its growth negative for that quarter! Both are temporary effects. Though I like snow, I’d much prefer a revolution that sets a country on the right path and unleashes the creative talent of its people and generates the goodwill that all sections of Egyptian society have started displaying, energies that can be harnessed for the good of the country after the transition to a reliable leadership for the future.

It was a peaceful revolution. The country’s facilities have not been damaged in any noticeable way. When production of goods and services restarts, it will be quickly back to normal levels. Furthermore, if (as expected) corruption levels are lower, more of the resources that are currently being leaked out of the economy in favour of a few individuals will actually be accounted for and will remain part of the economy and circulate within a virtuous circle of activity creation, hence benefit Egypt.

The same goes for tourism, where all the sites remain intact. The revolution has earned the admiration of the masses abroad and, this on its own, will generate extra tourism to the country where the first Facebook revolution took place! There is one more historical place to visit in Egypt, the Square that is truly a Liberation Square.

The damage to the financial side will also be temporary. The valuation of companies whose directors are involved in financial scandals will collapse, but these are companies that are not widely held by the middle and lower income groups, something that is also true of the stock market at large where some initial contagion will take place but it is inevitable that prices go down and up. Good companies have nothing to fear and much to look forward to, as I will explain in the next paragraph. From a wealth point of view, the damage into the future will be limited to a small group of shareholders whose consumption is a tiny chunk of the economy. But their investments are substantial and this can have a negative impact if the new government mismanages the handling of their assets. The government may seize these assets but should not attempt to run them as a going concern. It should also not use its currency reserves unwisely.

A company going bust does not mean that its business is gone for the economy: some other company could buy the stock or step into the breach and take the opportunity as a new entity. Even better, corrupt monopolies, duopolies, etc. (such as the steel industry) can be replaced by more competition, and this is good for the economy and its development.

A lot of investment was in real estate, much of it was speculative, affecting prices and valuations of property but not leading in any meaningful way to an increase in the national income that we mentioned earlier. A reduction in these valuations is not the end of the economy, as some interested parties are currently circulating.

With increased financial transparency and less corruption, genuine investments and businesses will actually be encouraged to come to Egypt. This will not happen overnight, but Egyptians build for eternity.
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Karim M. Abadir (http://www.imperial.ac.uk/people/k.m.abadir) is Professor of Financial Econometrics at Imperial College London. He is credited with predicting the timing of the recent global recession and the subsequent diverging patterns of recovery in the US and Europe.