Report contents
MENA · Developing
Egypt
Crypto Livability Index 2025·data to 31 Dec 2025
Scoreboard
Five pillars, then the 22 sub-pillars scored 0 to 4. Empty sub-scores are held out of the total, not zeroed.
The number behind the rank
| Raw capability score | 25 / 84 |
| P2P liquidity bonus (tie-breaker) | +3 |
| Inflation 25.5% · unbanked 57% · remittances 7.6% GDP · capital controls 0.58 · sanctions 0 | CNI 0.393 |
| Need multiplier | ×1.089 |
| Livability score | 0.324 |
Raw 25/84 = 0.298 capability. Crypto-Necessity Index 0.39, from five components: inflation 25.5% (three-year average 2023 to 2025), unbanked 57% of adults, remittances 7.6% of GDP, capital-control intensity 0.58 (KAOPEN 2023), sanctions exposure 0. Need multiplier ×1.09. Livability score 0.324, rank #67 of 79.
Three findings
A total ban over one of the fastest-growing markets on earth
Central Bank Law No. 194 of 2020, Article 206, prohibits issuing, trading, or promoting crypto without a CBE licence, and none has ever been granted, with violations carrying fines up to 10 million pounds. Yet 11.3 million Egyptians, roughly 10 percent of the population, are active users, and activity surged 42.8 percent in 2025 as the pound devalued. The ban drives all four regulation sub-scores to zero while the lived market expands underneath it.
Capital flight wearing the mask of a savings account
With the pound floated and down more than 40 percent since 2022, residents route into Tether through Binance P2P (peer-to-peer trading between individuals), Vodafone Cash, and Fawry. Gulf remittance fees above 10 percent give the diaspora a second reason: against a 21.6 billion dollar formal remittance baseline, an estimated 250 to 500 million dollars in retail crypto inflows places Egypt's corridor utility above the ban-implied floor.
The strongest spending catalog of the MENA ban states
Despite the prohibition, gift-card depth reaches the 40 to 55 brand range, the second-highest of the region's banned markets, spanning Carrefour, Jumia, Metro, and the three mobile operators alongside the global digital roster. Merchants, cards, and utility bills, by contrast, all read zero: holders can stock value but cannot openly spend it.
In one line
"Egypt bans crypto and ranks among the fastest-growing markets on the planet at the same time. Eleven million people did the arithmetic on a currency that lost 40 percent and a remittance fee above ten, and a fourth central-bank warning did not change the answer."
Watch in 2026
Trajectory 2/4, stable with an entrenched prohibition. Law 194/2020 was not amended in 2024 or 2025; the CBE issued its fourth warning statement in 2025, advisory rather than a new restriction, with no licensing scheme floated and no draft amendment circulated. The framework hardens by repetition while its direction stays flat.