Since the beginning of 2022, central banks have begun a series of raising interest rates to counter the bout of inflation driven by the previous generous monetary easing programs, which flooded households around the world to overcome the Covid pandemic.
Some countries witnessed high rates to unimaginable levels in an attempt to attract foreign investments in debt securities to temporarily solve their crises, and the situation varied from one country to another, as Argentina ranked first in the world after the interest rate reached 97%.
The case of Argentina is somewhat different, as it was suffering from economic crises and collapses prior to the Corona pandemic, and was subjected to successive strikes starting from the Corona pandemic, and the supply chain crisis, which deepened the crises, as it is the country most indebted to the International Monetary Fund, and has the worst reputation in international arbitration cases, It also ranks first in the world in the number of arbitration cases brought against it in Exceed.
Pakistan came second in the world with interest rates of 21%, which were recently increased with the entry of the Asian country into a program with the International Monetary Fund, and in addition to global crises, Pakistan was hit by one of the worst torrents and floods that destroyed crops and infrastructure last year. driven by climate change.
With Egypt’s entry into a $3 billion bailout program with the International Monetary Fund, rising inflation rates of more than 36%, and the successive declines of the Egyptian pound, interest rates have increased dramatically, reaching 18.25%, to come in third place in the world.
Egypt is awaiting the IMF review of the first phase, which will disburse the second tranche of the programme.
While interest rates in Iran recorded 18% (the fourth in the world), followed by Brazil (13.75%), Mexico (11.25%), then Turkey (8.5%).
And the US Federal Reserve’s decisions to increase interest rates to the level of 5.25% reinforced the general tendency of central banks around the world to tighten their monetary policies, whether to combat inflation, maintain their investment attractiveness against US Treasury bonds, or even to defend exchange rates.
While Japan remains a different case, as it is the only country in the world that maintains a negative interest rate of (-0.1%), amid suspicions that the Japanese Central Bank will abandon its accommodative policy, while the country maintains one of the lowest inflation rates around the world.
