Per the IMF’s data, Egypt currently owes the bank approximately $6.7 billion dollars, with the second most indebted African country owing around $2 billion less.
Despite the huge debt, the IMF disclosed that its executive board recently completed its 7th review under the Extended Fund Facility (EFF) arrangement and the second review under the Resilience and Sustainability Facility (RSF) arrangement, allowing about $1.8 billion to be disbursed to the Northern African country.
“The Executive Board of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) completed the seventh review under the 48-month Extended Arrangement under the Extended Fund Facility (EFF) and the second review under the Resilience and Sustainability Facility (RSF) arrangement for the Arab Republic of Egypt,” the IMF revealed via a statement.
“Completion of the reviews allows the authorities to immediately draw the equivalent of SDR 1.11 billion (about US$1.5 billion) under the EFF and SDR 200 million (about US$272 million) under the RSF, bringing total purchases and disbursements under the two arrangements to about SDR 5.4 billion (about US$7.3 billion),” it added.
Egypt’s economic performance
The global lender revealed that the loan was disbursed owing to the fact that Egypt’s current macroeconomic standing despite the conflict in the MENA region, is much more sturdy, compared to when when it asked for a loan under immense external stress.
In retrospect, the war in the Middle Eastern region has had little to no economic impact on Egypt, reflecting the prompt and decisive policy decisions taken by Egypt, such as efforts to control budget expenditures, energy price changes, and exchange rate flexibility.
“Economic activity has continued to recover, with real GDP growth reaching 5 percent in the third quarter of FY2025/26, bringing growth over the first nine months of the fiscal year to 5.2 percent,” the IMF disclosed.
“This performance is expected to help keep growth in FY 2025/26 at about 4.6 percent, only 0.1 percentage points lower than at the time of the 5 th and 6 th Reviews,” it added.
Egypt’s fiscal success has been consistent for months now.
Both the primary balance and tax revenue objectives were surpassed by the end of March 2026, demonstrating effective efforts to mobilize revenue and control spending.
While ongoing revenue mobilization is anticipated to raise the primary surplus from 4.8 percent of GDP in FY2025/26 to 5 percent of GDP in FY2026/27, the tax-to-GDP ratio is predicted to expand by 1.2 percentage points in FY 2025/26.
Additionally, the country’s headline inflation decreased gradually until March 2026, when it rose to 15.2 percent—roughly 1.4 percentage points above staff expectations, primarily as a result of depreciating exchange rates and rising energy costs. While core inflation increased to 14.3 percent in June, headline inflation later decreased to 14.3 percent.
Source: africabusinessinsider