Someone I know in Egypt has a co-worker that was recently arrested for being a “black market” dollar dealer.
Authorities don’t mind if you own dollar accounts in Egyptian banks. But they don’t like you withdrawing them. They want to be able to fractionally reserve them, rehypothecate them, etc.
Unlike Argentina, Nigeria, Lebanon, Turkey, and many other countries, stablecoins are not popular in Egypt for dollar exposure. A common reason cited is they don’t like the intangibility of them. Same for bitcoin. But black market dollars are commonly traded for, albeit with legal risk.
