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Check out the companies making headlines before the bell: Oracle (ORCL) – Oracle beat estimates by 2 cents a share,
with quarterly profit of 90 cents per share. The business software
giant’s revenue fell short of Wall Street estimates and its
current-quarter earnings outlook falls largely below Wall Street
forecasts. Separately, Chairman Larry Ellison said the company has no
plans to appoint a second CEO following the October death of co-CEO Mark
Hurd. Safra Catz will remain the sole chief executive. Adobe (ADBE) – Adobe reported quarterly profit of $2.29 per share,
3 cents a share above estimates. The software company’s revenue was
slightly above forecasts as well. Investors were encouraged by Adobe’s
ability to maintain a revenue growth rate above 20%. Costco
(COST) – Costco came in a penny a share ahead of estimates, with
quarterly profit of $1.73 per share. The warehouse retailer’s revenue
came in below forecasts, however, due to a slowdown in e-commerce
growth. Broadcom (AVGO) – Broadcom beat estimates by 4 cents a share,
reporting quarterly profit of $5.39 per share. The chipmaker’s revenue
also exceeded forecasts. Broadcom said it was benefiting from strong
demand for 5G-related chips as well as software unit growth. Broadcom
also raised its target dividend by 23% to $3.25 per share for fiscal
2020. Sarepta Therapeutics
(SRPT) – The drugmaker received an early Food and Drug Administration
approval for its second treatment for Duchenne muscular dystrophy.
Sarepta will still need to conduct a trial to confirm the drug’s
benefits, which it said it expects to conclude by 2024. Tapestry
(TPR) – The luxury goods company said Kate Spade CEO Anna Bakst will
depart at the end of 2019, after less than two years on the job.
Same-store sales at the handbag maker have been falling since Kate Spade
was acquired by Tapestry – then known as Coach – in 2017. Liberty Sirius XM Group
(LSXMA) – The affiliate of John Malone’s Liberty Media is seeking
Justice Department permission to increase its stake in radio broadcaster
iHeartMedia (IHRT), according to The Wall Street Journal. Liberty currently owns a 4.8% stake. Boeing (BA) – American Airlines (AAL) took Boeing’s grounded 737 Max jet off its schedules through April 6. Snap
(SNAP) – The Snapchat parent was upgraded to “outperform” from “market
perform” at JMP Securities, which cites optimism about Snap’s ability to
grow its user base. Lyft
(LYFT) – The ride-hailing service has begun offering car rentals
through its app, with the service initially available in the San
Francisco Bay area and in Los Angeles. The news could impact shares of
car rental companies like Hertz Global (HTZ) and Avis Budget (CAR). OneConnect Financial
(OCFT) – The financial technology provider priced its initial public
offering at $10 per American depositary share. It had lowered the
expected range to $9 to $10 per share Wednesday from the prior $12 a
share. OneConnect is a unit of China’s Ping An Insurance and has Japan’s
SoftBank as one of its primary investors.
BREAKING:
The
U.S. and China have reached agreement on a tentative trade deal, which
President Trump is expected to formally approve this afternoon,
according to several people familiar with the administration’s internal
deliberations. “The deal is essentially done. The mechanics of how
you execute it and how you get it signed still have to be worked out,”
said one of the people, who requested anonymity because they were not
authorized to speak to the press.
Under
one scenario, Robert E. Lighthizer, the president’s chief trade
negotiator, and Chinese Ambassador to the U.S. Cui Tiankai could sign
the document as soon as tomorrow. Alternatively, Lighthizer and Treasury
Secretary Steven Mnuchin could travel to Beijing for the signing.
Business
leaders who have grown anxious for relief from the trans-Pacific tariff
wars welcomed the news. “That is excellent news. It puts a floor under
the deterioration in the relationship,” said Craig Allen, president of
the U.S.-China Business Council.
Myron Brilliant, executive vice
president of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, said the deal would benefit
American manufacturers and farmers. “It’s an important first step, but
just a first step,” he said. “There is more work to be done.”
Several
people close to the talks said the administration had not shared with
them the text of the deal, which they described as an
“agreement-in-principle.” Trump two months said he had reached “an
agreement in principle” with China and expected to commit the terms to
paper within a few weeks.
Trump met with his top advisers Thursday afternoon as they prepared for a final decision within hours.
The
president has until Sunday to determine whether to impose tariffs on
$160 billion in Chinese imports. Most analysts expected Trump to delay
or cancel the import tax in hopes of reaching an initial trade deal.
Even
before a formal presidential decision to proceed, Republican critics of
the so-called “Phase One” agreement sounded the alarm.
Senator
Marco Rubio, a Florida Republican and member of the Senate Foreign
Relations Committee, warned against settling too quickly with Beijing. “@WhiteHouse should consider the risk that a near-term deal with #China
would give away the tariff leverage needed for a broader agreement on
the issues that matter the most such as subsidies to domestic firms,
forced tech transfers & blocking U.S. firms access to key sectors,”
Rubio tweeted.
Derek Scissors, a China hawk with the American
Enterprise Institute and occasional administration adviser, accused the
president of rushing to make a deal. “This is really weird,” Scissors
said. “Technically, there’s been a deal on the table for the president
to sign for some time. What’s changed is they think the president will
say ‘yes.’”
Early Thursday morning, Trump teased investors with
word of a potential deal with China, sending the stock market briefly
higher amid optimism about a breakthrough in the lengthy standoff.
“Getting
VERY close to a BIG DEAL with China,” the president tweeted shortly
after Wall Street opened. “They want it, and so do we!”
The Dow
Jones industrial average quickly rose more than 300 points, or roughly 1
percent, within the first hour of trading as financial markets cheered
the prospect of a “Phase 1” deal with China. The market later
surrendered some of its gains, though, and was up fewer than 100 points
in shortly before the close of trading.
U.S. officials have said
they are nearing a limited accord that will require China to buy large
amounts of American farm goods, tighten its intellectual property
protections, ease access to its financial services market and agree to
strict enforcement measures in return for the reversal of some U.S.
tariffs. The emerging deal would fall well short
of the president’s initial goal: a comprehensive settlement of U.S.
complaints about subsidized Chinese state businesses and trade secrets
theft.
The president has often suggested the two sides were close
to a deal only to see negotiations stall in the past. In April, Trump
said the White House and Chinese negotiators were within weeks of an
“epic” deal. The next month, talks collapsed amid U.S. charges that
Beijing had reneged on a tentative bargain.
Hints of progress with China come as the White House is celebrating victory on another front in Trump’s trade wars. This week, House Democrats agreed to support a revised version of a new North American trade deal, which the president had signed last year with Mexico and Canada.
House
Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) backed the agreement after securing
amendments that toughened enforcement of labor and environmental
standards. The modified accord also dropped an extension of patent
protections for a class of new drugs known as biologics, which Democrats
said would lead to higher prescription drug prices.
The new
U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement is expected to reach a House vote next week
and clear the Senate early next year. Once approved by the legislatures
in each country, it will supplant the 1994 North American Free Trade
Agreement, which Trump has called “our country’s worst trade deal.”
The
bipartisan cooperation on trade is occurring even as House Democrats
move forward with plans to impeach the president over his demand that
Ukraine announce an investigation of one of his political rivals before
receiving $391 million in congressionally authorized military aid.
Financial
regulators appointed by the Trump administration proposed Thursday an
overhaul of a 40-year-old anti-discrimination law, potentially upending
the way banks make loans to low-income communities.
The proposal
is another big win for the banking industry, which has argued for years
that 1977’s Community Reinvestment Act was outdated and didn’t account
for the popularity of online banking. Under the proposal, the industry
would gain new flexibility when attempting to comply with the law aimed
at stamping out redlining, in which banks either refused to lend to
people in minority neighborhoods or charge those borrowers more.
The
proposal is the Trump administration’s latest effort to radically
transform the housing market, including a massive plan released earlier
this year to shrink the government’s role in making mortgages.
Democrats
and consumer groups warn the most recent proposal would make it easier
for banks to comply with a law meant to stamp out decades of redlining.
“This is a major transformation of the law. It upends how the CRA
works,” said Jesse Van Tol, chief executive of the National Community
Reinvestment Coalition.
The proposal was unveiled by Office of the
Comptroller of the Currency and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. It
has sparked a rare split between financial regulators: The Federal
Reserve, which also regulates some banks’ compliance with the law, has
yet to sign off.
The Federal Reserve still hopes to reach an
agreement with the other regulators to support the proposal, Chair
Jerome Powell said at a press conference Wednesday. “I don’t know
whether that will be possible or not. We’ll just have to see,” he said.
“We would certainly not want to create confusion or a sort of tension
between the regimes if they do turn out to be slightly different
regimes.”
Powell said the Fed is “strongly committed to the
mission of ensuring that banks provide credit through their communities,
particularly addressing the needs of low- and moderate-income
households and neighborhoods. We also think it’s time for
modernization."
The public will have 60 days to comment on the proposal.
“We
are concerned that the changes … will make it easier for banks to pass
their CRA exams, weakening their obligation to responsibly serve
communities across the country," Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.), chair of
the Financial Services Committee, said in a statement before the
proposal was officially released. “It is critical that the banking
regulators do not jam through their proposal without giving the public
ample time to weigh in, or without coordinating with the Federal
Reserve.”
Under the Community Reinvestment Act, or CRA, regulators
periodically examine banks lending practices for low- and
moderate-income borrowers. A bank may get CRA credit, for example, for
issuing a mortgage to a black borrower, financing an affordable housing
project or a small business loan. Banks given a low rating can be hit
with sanctions.
Banks have complained that they are judged too
subjectively and don’t often know what types of loans would qualify for
credit under the law. The proposal would clarify what would qualify for
CRA credit and potentially give banks more flexibility around what parts
of the country the lending would be done in. Banks would also be
encouraged to make loans to lower-income borrowers based on where their
customers are rather than where the bank has physical branches.
But
Van Tol warned that broadening the definition of what counts toward
compliance with CRA could allow banks to focus on projects with the most
profit. They “would rather finance a billion-dollar hospital facility
than make mortgage loans to low- and moderate-income people,” he said.
“The motivations and incentives are going to go places where you can
make the most money.”
The existing law should be modernized and
simplified, consumer advocates say. But the Trump administration’s
proposal would only benefit banks and dilutes the original intention of
the law to address redlining, they say.
Redlining persists in 61 metro areas — including Detroit, Philadelphia, Little Rock and Tacoma, Wash., according to the Center for Investigative Reporting.
The proposal also comes at a time when research shows that banks are
closing down physical branches in black neighborhoods — including
high-income ones — faster than in the rest of the country.
Since
2010, the number of bank branches in majority-black areas has shrunk
14.6 percent compared with 9.7 percent in all other communities,
according to an analysis by S&P Global Market
Intelligence.
At JPMorgan Chase, the country’s largest bank, the number of bank
branches in majority-black areas fell by 22.8 percent compared with an
overall decline of less than 1 percent, the data showed.
The
Trump administration appeared to move closer to a trade deal with China
as the president was set to meet with his top economic advisors
Thursday afternoon.
The White House has offered to scrap its next
round of tariffs on Chinese goods set to take effect Sunday and slash
some existing duties in half, two sources told CNBC. The U.S. proposed
cutting existing tariffs on $360 billion in Chinese products by 50%.
The
development signals the White House’s willingness to rein in a trade
war between the world’s two largest economies that threatens to drag on
global growth. Bloomberg reported Thursday that
the U.S. reached a trade deal in principle in China, pending approval
from President Donald Trump. It is unclear how the agreement the news
outlet describes differs from a partial deal the president announced in
October.
Trump planned to meet with top advisors at 2:30 p.m. ET
on Thursday about whether to delay the next round of tariffs. Duties of
15% on about $160 billion in consumer goods are set to take effect on
Sunday, including on Chinese-made toys, computers, phones and clothing.
On
Thursday morning, Trump signaled optimism about an agreement with
China. He tweeted that the U.S. has moved close to a trade deal with
Beijing after several false starts and near misses.
“Getting VERY close to a BIG DEAL with China. They want it, and so do we!” the president wrote.
The White House tariff offer to Beijing, first reported in The Wall Street Journal
on Thursday, came last week and may have changed. Recent talks have
taken place mostly at the deputy level as U.S. Trade Representative
Robert Lighthizer tries to push the administration’s NAFTA replacement
through Congress.
Trump’s acknowledgement that the U.S. wants a
deal marks a shift in tone from recent weeks. He has repeatedly
contended that Beijing needs an agreement more than Washington does, and
suggested he was content waiting until after the November 2020 election
to strike a deal — a statement that disappointed investors. Major U.S. stock indexes jumped
as reports signaled a deal could be near. Investors hope the U.S. and
China can reach an accord before the tariff deadline and avoid a
potentially damaging escalation in their nearly 2-year-old trade war.
Trump
in October announced a partial “phase one” agreement with China as the
world’s two largest economies try to rein in the economic conflict.
Washington and Beijing have so far failed to sign the agreement, which
would have involved increased Chinese purchases of U.S. agricultural
products and possible tariff relief.
During months of
trade talks with China, the president has previously touted progress
before discussions crumbled. He has repeatedly said the negotiations are
going well, even as trade officials struggled to reach a deal.
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative did not immediately respond to a request to comment.
Trump
wants a broad trade agreement with China to address concerns about
intellectual property theft, forced technology transfers and trade
deficits. The president, who promised to crack down with China during
his 2016 campaign, sees an agreement as an economic and political
priority ahead of his 2020 reelection bid.
Not all of Trump’s advisors want to back off the planned duties. China hawk Peter Navarro, under the pseudonym “Ron Vara,” wrote a memo supporting the White House’s tariff strategy.
In
the document obtained by CNBC on Wednesday, he wrote that tariffs “are
working to defend [the] economy and have had no negative impacts on
growth or stock market rise.”
— CNBC’s Kayla Tausche and Eamon Javers contributed to this report
The
European Central Bank (ECB) kept its rates unchanged on Thursday
following new President Christine Lagarde’s first monetary policy
meeting in Frankfurt.
The Governing Council voted to keep the main
deposit rate at the historic low of -0.5%, in line with market
expectations, while the marginal lending facility remained at 0.25%.
The
ECB’s statement reiterated that rates will stay at the current level or
lower until the central bank has seen the inflation outlook “robustly
converge” to a level close to but below 0.2% and that underlying
inflation has remained consistently convergent with that level.
It
also confirmed that net asset purchases had started in November at a
monthly rate of 20 billion euros ($22.3 billion) and that this will
continue to run “as long as necessary” to reinforce the accommodative
policy stance.
The euro
traded roughly flat against the dollar at $1.1132 following the
announcement awhile equity markets turned slightly negative after
marginal early gains.
The ECB forecast annual real GDP
growth for the euro area at 1.2% in 2019, 1.1% in 2020 and 1.4% in 2021
and 2022, an upward revision of 0.1% for 2019 and a downward shift of
0.1% for 2020 compared with September’s projections.
Lagarde
suggested that the growth slowdown was stabilizing but that incoming
data since October’s policy meeting “pointed to continued muted
inflation pressures and weak euro area growth dynamics.”
“The
risks to the euro area growth outlook relating to geopolitical factors,
rising protectionism and vulnerabilities in emerging markets remain
tilted to the downside, but have become somewhat less pronounced,” she
added.
Inflation was revised up by 0.1% for 2020 but down by 0.1% to 1.4% for 2021, with 2022 forecast at 1.6%.
“In
our 2022 forecast for inflation, while the entire year is forecast at
1.6%, the fourth quarter is at 1.7%, so directionally it is slightly
increasing across the course of 2022,” Lagarde said in her first press
conference at the ECB’s helm.
“Is it satisfactory? It is certainly directionally good, but is it the aim that we pursue? No,” she added.
The
former head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and former French
finance minister inherited an inflation rate of 1.0% against the ECB
target of “below but close to 2%” upon taking the reins in November.
In September, Lagarde’s predecessor Mario Draghi launched a massive stimulus package
which entailed a cut to the central bank’s main deposit rate a second
round of quantitative easing in a bid to stimulate the sluggish euro
zone economy.
The move proved controversial among the Council, but
Lagarde offered support to the bond-buying program and record low rates
back in September, highlighting that the challenges warranting a highly
accommodative policy stance had not diminished.
While Lagarde was
not expected to break from the trajectory set in motion by Draghi so
early in her tenure, investors will be closely monitoring the semantics
in her impending press conference for any hints on future policy
direction.
One of her first moves was to announce a wide-ranging
policy review, the first since 2003, with the euro zone central bank’s
current stance under fire from market participants. At Thursday’s
press conference, Lagarde said the review would get underway in January
with a view to completion by the end of 2020, and would reach out “not
just to the usual suspects” but also Members of European Parliament
(MEPs), the academic community and “civil society representatives.”
CAIRO - Gamal el Adl’s company is one of the most
popular television producers in the Middle East. Its gritty soap operas,
touching on drug addiction amongst the middle classes, sexual abuse and
life in a women’s prison, have been hits on TV in Egypt and across the
Arab world.
Until, that is, President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi unleashed a new wave of censorship.
In
the past three years, the former general has turned the screws on the
entertainment and news industries. A new regulatory agency is overseeing
output and censoring content. Soap operas, it insists, must contain no
sex scenes, no blasphemy, no politics. Police and other authority
figures should be presented in a positive light.
President Abdel
Fattah al-Sisi, above, has clamped down on TV news and entertainment and
a state-owned firm has been buying up networks and programme makers.
REUTERS/Al Youm Al Saabi Newspaper
El Adl says he thought he could manage
by steering clear of the biggest taboos. But when he heard that police
had raided the film set of a rival early this year because it lacked a
necessary permit, he revised his view. He immediately halted work on the
two soaps he was filming, fearing he too would run into trouble for not
having a permit.
He couldn’t operate in this environment, he said. “There was just one entity, one eye, one taste, one vision.”
It is President Sisi’s vision – one of heroism and patriotic virtue. And it is being pursued with innovative techniques.
In
interviews, programme makers, and news media executives described how
the Sisi administration has clamped down with controls that they say are
stricter than those that existed under Hosni Mubarak, who ruled Egypt
with a hard grip until being overthrown in 2011. Many details of the new
methods are reported here for the first time.
They
include the withholding of filming permits and a list of banned topics
for soaps that programme makers must agree to. The government has also
created two WhatsApp groups that instruct news media what to report, and
has placed censors at TV stations to oversee output.
Gamal el Adl’s
firm, one of Egypt’s most successful TV production companies, halted
work on two shows that were due to screen this year. REUTERS/Stringer
The government is also getting deeper
into the entertainment business itself. Since 2017, a new firm called
United Group for Media Services has taken control of news outlets, TV
production companies and channels - in all, at least 14 so far - giving
it unrivalled influence over the TV schedule. United Group has
enthusiastically enforced government censorship rules.
A
dozen industry and government sources told Reuters that United Group
for Media Services was set up by the state. Two of its four board
members have links to Egyptian General Intelligence, and one of the
company’s units was previously headed by the intelligence chief, Reuters
found.
Actors critical of the government say
they fear arrest. Programme makers say the dramas they make have become
bland like an insipid soup. Prime time talk show hosts who don’t fully
toe the government line are fired or side-lined. One producer said the
authorities have blocked him from working in TV or cinema, without
giving a reason.
Khaled Youssef, a member of the
Egyptian parliament and a prominent film director, said the government
is “interfering in the content of drama” and had pushed out private
production firms to exert control. A Sisi critic, Youssef now lives in
Paris in voluntary exile. “They don’t want people to think,” he said.
Film director
Khaled Youssef, above, believes the Egyptian government is interfering
in the content of drama. REUTERS/Benoit Tessier
Sisi’s clampdown on entertainment and
news comes as his government battles Islamist extremists who have
launched deadly attacks against tourists, churches and on the streets of
Cairo. The president’s hold on the media is typical of many
authoritarian governments, from China to Russia. Still, the clampdown in
Cairo is notable because of its implications outside Egypt. The nation
of 100 million is not only the Arab world’s most populous country, it is
home to its biggest film industry by far.
Censorship
is more oppressive now than under Hosni Mubarak’s autocratic rule,
programme makers say. In the final decade of the Mubarak regime, there
were productions that grappled with police brutality and homosexuality.
Where Mubarak’s censors would approve a soap after sampling just a few
episodes, Sisi’s insist on watching the entire series of 30 shows or
more.
An editor at a leading newspaper told
Reuters that even under Mubarak, publishers only faced intimidation if
articles named intelligence or military officers. Now, he said, the
chief of the General Intelligence Service, Abbas Kamel, and his officers
have firm and direct influence over what the media report. So much, he
said, that journalists have begun calling them “Egypt’s editors in
chief.”
The Egyptian government, intelligence
agency and media regulator didn’t respond to detailed questions for this
article. Reuters’ calls to the United Group for Media Services went
unanswered.
Sisi’s presidency began on a wave of
goodwill in 2014 after he led the military in toppling President
Mohammed Mursi, a Muslim Brotherhood leader who was democratically
elected but deeply unpopular by the time of his removal.
Sisi
exhorted the media to back his government. Announcing plans to dig a
second Suez Canal, a patriotic project on a vast scale, Sisi urged the
media to “help us in our fight” to unify Egypt. “It’s a very big fight,”
he declared. Delivering a speech to honour the country’s police a year
later, he called on the entertainment industry to make dramas and movies
that “give people hope and improve our values and ethics.”
By
2016 Sisi’s relationship with the media was deteriorating. In April of
that year, the president ceded two islands in a strategic part of the
Red Sea to his ally Saudi Arabia, leading to protests. When some
newspapers joined the outcry, security forces raided the Cairo office of
an organization that represents journalists. Two reporters critical of
the government were arrested and charged with spreading false news. It
was the beginning of a wider crackdown.
TV soap Kingdom Of Gypsies breached the censor’s code on 105 occasions this year. Photo from website
Then, in 2017, Sisi established the
Supreme Council for Media Regulation to oversee all news and
entertainment. Its drama committee was tasked with monitoring all soap
operas on Egyptian television. The council’s head was picked by the
president.
The committee has taken a keen interest in moral issues.
In
one report, issued this year, it criticised some soaps for their
depiction of characters smoking, swearing and “insulting the Arabic
language” by using English words. In a one-week period during the holy
month of Ramadan, when Egyptian families traditionally come together in
the evening to enjoy their favourite dramas, the committee recorded 948
breaches of its code. One series, “Kingdom of the Gypsies,” notched up
105 violations for vulgar language, violence, sexual innuendo and
“disrespecting” the Arabic language. Reuters couldn’t determine whether
the programme or its creators faced any sanction.
News media are under even greater
scrutiny. Hundreds of news websites and blogs have been blocked in
recent years and a media law passed in 2018 gives the state powers to
block social media accounts and punish journalists for publishing what
it considers to be false news.
The security
agencies created two WhatsApp groups to relay instructions to news
organizations about how to cover events. Reuters reviewed messages in
both groups. One is called “Editors” and run by the General
Intelligence. The second is run by the Ministry of the Interior. Neither
the ministry nor the intelligence agency responded to Reuters’ request
for comment about the WhatsApp groups.
When 20
people were killed in an explosion outside a Cairo cancer hospital in
April this year, an intelligence official wrote: “I don't want expansion
of the coverage of the cancer centre incident...limited coverage.”
Egyptian media obliged and reporting was limited.
In
May, a blast near Cairo’s Grand Egyptian Museum injured at least 12
South African tourists. The WhatsApp instruction was: “Please wait for
the Ministry of Interior statement and don’t add anything to it.”
Reuters reviewed the reports carried by four news outlets and found that
they were almost identical.
WhatsApp orders
also flowed in September, when a former actor called for protests
against Sisi in a series of YouTube videos. Mohamed Ali, who lives in
Spain, accused Sisi and Egypt’s military of corruption, claims that Sisi
dismissed as “lies and slander.”
“Please don’t
publish news reports about Mohammed Ali,” said one WhatsApp message.
Obediently, media reviewed by Reuters didn’t cover the videos, which
went viral on social media, until Sisi mentioned them in a speech two
weeks later. Contacted by Reuters, Ali declined to comment.
For staff at TV network DMC, also controlled by
United Group for Media Services, the state is intrusive. Before the
station can broadcast its news, sports and entertainment programmes, its
editors need a green light from the plain-clothed intelligence officers
who are a constant presence in DMC’s studios, one current and one
former employee told Reuters.
The former
employee said the network was effectively “run by intelligence officers”
who attended executive meetings. Some senior appointments were made by
Kamel, chief of the General Intelligence Service, who also set some
salaries. A producer who still works at DMC said an intelligence officer
sometimes sat in the control room to see what was going on at the
channel. Reuters couldn’t reach company management for comment and
Kamel, contacted via the Egyptian authorities, didn’t respond.
“The
damage that has been done to the Egyptian media is unbelievable,
unprecedented," said Hisham Kassem, a former newspaper publisher and
political activist. “It’s easily the worst media disaster in the history
of Egypt. They don’t care about quality – if you disagree, they’ll sack
you."
Actor Amr Waked,
shown in 2012, says today’s Egyptian TV scripts could have been written
by a police officer. REUTERS/Luke MacGregor
Central to the state’s tightening grip
on Egypt’s entertainment industry is a company called United Group for
Media Services. Established in 2017, the firm has taken over at least
six newspapers and news websites, four TV networks encompassing 14
channels, four radio stations and several theatres and cinemas. Eight
people in the media industry who have done business with United Group
for Media Services said the company was set up by the state. As it has
expanded, United Group has come to dominate the TV schedules and
determine which programmes make it to air. It has strictly enforced
government censorship.
Reuters reviewed
documents filed by United Group for Media Services with the authorities
since its registration. These documents didn’t disclose the ownership of
the company, but they did identify its four board members.
Two
intelligence sources told Reuters that two members of the board had
links to the intelligence service. One of them, Yaser Ahmed Saber Ahmed
Seliem, was previously an intelligence officer. Another document showed
that intelligence chief Kamel himself previously sat on the board of a
TV firm called D-Media that is now part of United Group. Seliem and
Kamel, contacted via the Egyptian authorities, didn’t respond to a
request for comment.
For programme makers like
el Adl, the dominance of one big buyer, United Group for Media Services,
and the emergence of a strict new regulator made creating and selling
dramas increasingly difficult. At the end of last year he waited in vain
for his usual filming permit. With time running short, he decided to
start work on two soaps, assuming the permit would arrive soon and, if
his scripts avoided the taboos of sex and politics, he wouldn’t get into
trouble.
“I thought I’d make the programmes
anyway and if the local channels didn’t buy them then I could sell them
outside Egypt,” he explained. But three episodes into filming, police
raided the set of a now defunct rival production company. Two police
cars pulled up at the shoot and told the crew to stop filming because
they didn’t have a license, three crew members and a security source
said. The crew complied. El Adl decided to stop filming too in order to
stay out of trouble.
El Adl and some other
programme makers say that, at first, they supported the state’s
intervention in the TV market on economic grounds. Many of Egypt’s
television channels were unprofitable, partly because they were trying
to outbid one another for content. The cost of the soaps made by el Adl
and others were rising and actors’ wages were spiralling. El Adl was
among those calling for price regulation, he said. The state’s entry
into the business has put a lid on wages but the intervention has gone
too far. The authorities are now “the ones who decide whether you work
or not.”
He is hopeful that 2020 will be a
better year. He expects to pick up filming his two soaps, provided he
stays within the new budget limits and works within the new system. “We
figured out that the authorities were making a framework for people to
follow,” he said.
Another director of movies
and soaps, who declined to be identified, said he believes Sisi is
trying “to control the narrative.” The director said he’d had to sign a
document pledging not to include any scenes in his dramas that
“insulted” the police. He was told that if there was a shootout,
officers mustn’t be seen to die because this would be bad for the
force’s morale. The director fell into line.
The
president’s efforts risk backfiring, however, this director said.
Viewers are increasingly turning to channels operated by Egyptians
outside the country, offering shows with alternative views or less
censorship, such as Mekameleen and al-Sharq, both based in Turkey. The
channels didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Each year, during the holy month of
Ramadan, millions of Egyptian families gather in the evening to watch
their favourite soaps. But this year there was a difference.
Government
officials held a meeting with a group of trusted writers and directors,
according to two sources who were briefed on the conversation that took
place. The officials set out the themes and ideas they wanted to see in
TV soaps, and those they didn’t. They told the assembled writers and
directors that dramas shouldn’t show police officers or members of the
security services in a negative light, cheating on their wives, for
instance.
Many Egyptians complain that Sisi is
depriving them even of the right to have fun. Before the president came
to power, the Ramadan audience could choose from 40 or more dramas
exploring social issues, family relationships, mysteries and crime. The
soaps were a cherished part of the holy month, when millions of
Egyptians would spend the evenings glued to their television sets.
Many of this year’s crop of soaps, including Kalabsh, above, portray police officers fighting “evil forces.” Photo from website
But during this year’s Ramadan, which
fell in May, there were only 25 soaps, 15 of them made by a firm called
Synergy, which is part of the United Group for Media Services. Many of
the shows showed police officers heroically fighting “evil forces” – a
term Sisi uses to describe opposition figures and Islamist militants.
One, called Kalabsh, told the story of a special forces officer who fights terrorists and corruption.
Shows
like this, says award-winning actor Amr Waked, underscore how Egypt’s
entertainment industry is withering. Waked reached a global audience
when he appeared alongside George Clooney in Syriana, a 2005 thriller.
“It’s as if the soaps are written by a police officer,” Waked said.
Waked
was last in an Egyptian soap in 2017, and he now lives in self-imposed
exile in Spain. In 2018, a military court sentenced him in absentia to
eight years in prison for spreading false news and insulting state
institutions. Waked believes he was targeted because of his
pro-democracy tweets. The Egyptian government didn’t respond to a
request for comment about Waked’s case.
“Throughout my entire life, I have never seen Egypt worse than this,” Waked said.
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