Egypt Chairs AFE’s GA And The First Board Of Directors Elections Virtually

During the Arab Federation of Exchanges (AFE) General Assembly meeting held virtually today, members of the federation elected the Board of Directors representing three regions and CSD companies as well as members of the Audit and Governance Committee. The meeting held today was headed by Dr. Mohamed Farid, Chairman of the AFE and Executive Chairman of The Egyptian Exchange (EGX). This is part of the AFE’s institutional transformation plan for the development of the federation and its members to play a greater role in supporting the economic and social development plans of the Arab nation.

The AFE GA virtual meeting witnessed the election of the following board members; The Egyptian Exchange as a member and chairing the board, Casablanca Stock Exchange, both for the North African region, Tadawul Stock Exchange and Bahrain bourse for the Gulf region, Amman Stock Exchange and Beirut Stock Exchanges for the Levant Region, and lastly, Misr for Clearing Settlement and Central depository and Kuwait Clearing Company representing CSD Companies. Members of the Audit and Governance Committee elected are Damascus Securities Exchange, Muscat Clearing and Depository, and Khartoum Stock Exchange.

Dr. Mohamed Farid, Chairman of the AFE and Executive Chairman of EGX, said that the election of AFE’s first board of directors is an unprecedented strategic step in the federation’s transformation process reflecting the current management's keenness to continue its reform and development plan. "Our business strategy is based on several axes, most important of which is putting the federation on a stable long-term path through policies and regulations that contributes to the development of the industry, as well as developing a permanent platform for exchanging experiences between all relevant parties,".

He added that leaders of the Arab exchanges showed remarkable performance in dealing with the turmoil in the markets a result of the pandemic, as this worldwide crises revealed the stability and resilience of the Arab capital markets. He saidthe coming period will witness efforts to build the capacity of Arab stock exchanges.
As part of the AFE activities, AFE and Refinitiv launched the Refinitiv-AFE Low Carbon Select Index in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) as Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) data and analytics is becoming of critical importance for MENA financial markets. The new index represents an ESG benchmark offering investors the opportunity to commit capital to companies that actively promote and invest in low carbon activities across their business operations in MENA.
Also, AFE organized a training program attended by a number of high level members of the AFE. The training was hosted by SIX Group in Zurich-Switzerland, for capacity building of the Arab exchanges.

The Arab Federation of Exchanges was established in June 1978 to be the guiding body for the Arab stock exchanges, under the recommendation of the Arab Central Banks Conference, held under the auspices of the General Secretariat of the League of Arab States in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan.

The Arab Federation of Exchanges currently has 17 exchanges (Equity & commodity) and 4 clearing houses. In addition to multiple affiliate members from all over the Arab World. The Federation was set up to contribute to the “development of regulations and promoting harmonized and proactive legislations, and exchanging viewpoints and providing opportunities for cooperation among members