About Tarek Amer
Tarek Amer, governor of the Central Bank of Egypt, said in February 2020 that his key concern was global economic events, citing Egypt's integration into the international community. He noted that the country was tested in 2018 during the trade war, losing twelve billion dollars in funds, but stated that the loss did not affect Egypt's program or indicators, with reserves, currency stability, growth, and inflation remaining steady.
Amer acknowledged that liberalized foreign exchange markets create risks of rapid capital inflows and outflows. He said the central bank is prepared to manage such volatility, drawing on experience from crises in 2008, 2011, 2013, 2016, and 2018. Amer stated that the bank maintains buffers to prevent further shocks to the domestic economy.
Source: AI-verified profile updated from Tarek Amer's recent appearances.
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Transcript (3 segments)
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Tarek Amer0:10
Tested in 2018 when there was this trade war and many emerging markets were affected and we lost a lot of funds in 2018, but it did not affect our program or our indicators. So this was an examination and a test for the resilience of our program, but we continue to have a very close eye on what's happening globally because what you've done by your own admission, sir, is you've liberalized foreign exchange markets. You said the markets are open here in Egypt for international investors, but that creates with it, as we know from many frontier emerging developing nations as well, that the capital can come in very aggressively.
Think George Osborne once said while the sun was shining. It happened in 2018. We lost twelve billion dollars for our economy. This is a substantial amount of money, but nobody felt anything. Our reserves were intact, our currency was stable, and our growth continued and inflation continued to go down. So we are prepared for this. We have an experience at the central bank in managing this kind of investments over the last 20 years. We've seen 2008, we've seen 2011, our revolution, we've seen 2013, and we've seen the reforms in 2016.
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Giovanna Barrace2:11
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