African Development Bank Approves $ 70 Mln Loan to Egypt's Suez Canal Bank

The African Development Bank (ADB) has approved a US $ 70 million loan to finance a line of credit to the Suez Canal Bank of Egypt (SCB).

The objective of the line of credit is to provide financial resources to the SCB for medium to long-term lending to its best corporate clients in the manufacturing, industry, tourism, petrochemicals and energy, services, pharmaceuticals, agro-business and social sectors.

SCB was established in 1978. With over 22 years of profitable banking experience, SCB has grown to be the seventh largest commercial bank in Egypt and a major provider of financial services to private and business clients as well as SME's in Egypt.

The credit line will contribute through SCB to the promotion of private sector, which ranks high among the Egyptian government priorities of socio-economic development.

The proceeds of the credit line will be used to finance sub-projects that are mostly export oriented. These sub-projects will help to substantially increase government revenue, raise the rate of GDP growth, reduce the rate of unemployment and increase exports.

The money will also facilitate the expansion of the production facilities of recently privatized SOEs, and in so doing, encourage further transfer of public-sector enterprises to the private sector.