Middle East · GDP rank #38
EG · EGP @ 0.0189/USD
Egypt is the Arab world's most populous economy and the region's clearest case of payments digitisation forced from above. Vodafone Cash leads a mobile-money market with 46m active wallets; Meeza, the state-backed national card scheme, sits on roughly 55% of cards in issue and is the default rail for government salary, pension and welfare disbursement; InstaPay, the CBE-operated instant rail, crossed 1.5bn cumulative transactions in 2024 and ran at ~263m transactions in Q1 2025 alone. The March 2024 float of the pound under the IMF programme redrew every cross-border line on the page and pulled remittance inflows back through formal channels.
Tab 04
The macro backdrop that actually bends payment behaviour. Nominal GDP, real growth, CPI, policy rate, and FX volatility set the backdrop; interchange, MDR, FX regime, and capital-control posture set the industry-specific dynamics.
Nominal GDP
USD · 2024
Population
people · 2024
Adults with a bank account
% · Jun 2025
CBE definition combines bank accounts, mobile wallets and prepaid Meeza accounts.
Smartphone penetration
% of adults · 2024
Interchange caps
Interchange is the per-transaction fee an acquirer pays an issuer — the floor underneath every MDR merchants see. Domestic caps (where they exist) shape the market far more than individual network schedules.
Regulator · Central Bank of Egypt
Meeza interchange is set bilaterally with CBE guidance; Visa and Mastercard domestic interchange follows scheme defaults, typically materially higher.
Credit interchange (domestic)
% of transaction value · 2024
Debit interchange (domestic)
% of transaction value · 2024
Merchant discount rate
The MDR is the fully-loaded cost of card acceptance to the merchant — interchange, scheme fees, and acquirer margin. Small-merchant pricing is routinely 2-3x the large-merchant average.
1.8–3.0% for blended-pricing SMBs; Fawry, Paymob and Geidea bundled tariffs sit at the lower end
Avg. credit MDR (large merchant)
% · 2024
Avg. debit MDR
% · 2024
Active regulation
Effective · 2022-03-15
FRA-administered licensing framework for non-banking fintech; first comprehensive licences issued 2024–26 across consumer finance, money-market funds, custody and SME finance.
Source · Egyptian Financial Regulatory Authority (FRA)
Effective · 2020-09-15
Modernises CBE supervisory powers over payment systems and electronic-money institutions; basis for IPN and InstaPay licensing.
Source · Central Bank of Egypt
Effective · 2020-10-15
Egypt's first comprehensive data-protection statute; Data Protection Centre operationalising in 2025–26 with implementing regulations.
Source · Ministry of Communications and Information Technology
Effective · 2024-03-06
US$8bn EFF programme; conditioned on unified single FX rate, fiscal consolidation and structural reforms. Fourth review completed Q1 2026.
Source · International Monetary Fund
Effective · 2024-09-01
September 2024 amendment broadened obligations on payment-service providers including MFS and BNPL operators; aligns with FATF Mutual Evaluation Report follow-up.
Source · Egyptian Money Laundering and Terrorism Financing Combating Unit
Effective · 2024-09-01
First operational rollout phase of CBE open-banking standards covering account-information and payment-initiation APIs; 12 licensed participants by Q1 2026.
Source · Central Bank of Egypt