Business sentiments of Egypt's non-oil businesses hit record low

Only 4% of firms, just one out of 25, surveyed for Egypt’s purchasing manager’s index (PMI) in October gave a positive outlook for the next 12 months, the lowest recorded level. 

As the PMI index grew marginally, reaching 47.7 in October, up from 47.6 last month – anything below 50.0 indicates business conditions are deteriorating – the country remains heavily impacted by the Russia-Ukraine war, the PMI report for the months said. 

David Owen, chief economist at S&P Global Market Intelligence said that the deteriorating local and global economic environment is likely to hurt the country’s non-oil sector even further. 

He said 5% of survey respondents raised their charges in October even though 24% saw a rise in costs, adding that firms are being forced to shoulder the burden of increasing costs as demand weakens. 

The sequence of deteriorating PMI index scores has now continued for just under two years, the report said, and despite ticking up to the highest since February, the headline index was still below its long-run average and indicated another solid decline in operating conditions. 

“The fall was accompanied by a sustained decrease in new business inflows, which dropped solidly though to the least extent for eight months,” the report added.