Egypt’s stocks ended the trading day on Wednesday with a surge as many investors, especially foreigners, seemed hopeful following leaks of potential ministers in the new government under Hisham Qandil.

New Prime Minister Qandil on Wednesday met president Mohamed Morsi who reviewed the final list of names chosen by the PM to form the new cabinet.

The main index EGX30 rose by 1.5 per cent recording 4.935.59 points.

Egyptians were net-sellers with LE7.3 million.

Foreign investors’ purchases worth LE40.2 million strongly contributed to the rise of the benchmark.

Most of the heavyweight shares ended the day’s trading in green led by Orascom Construction Industries and Commercial International Bank, which rose by 3.1 per cent and 1.6 per cent respectively.

Ezz Steel also gained 2.3 per cent after it resumed trading.

On Tuesday trading on Ezz Steel was suspended after recent newspapers reports claimed that some banks have frozen financing worth $148 million for the Group.

Property shares Palm hills and Talaat Mostafa Group were among gainers by 1 per cent and 0.5 per cent respectively.

Orascom Telecom and its affiliate Orascom Telecom, Media and Technology were among decliners as most of their investors went on profit-taking due to a series of gains over the last week. They declined by 0.3 per cent and 5 per cent respectively.

Of listed 168 stocks, 79 gained and 65 saw losses in a session which witnessed a good daily turnover of LE349 million.