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Sale of Suez Canal Shares

When: 1875
Where: Egypt
Part of: Britain buys Egypt's Suez Canal share

Isma'il Pasha sold Egypt's 44% share in the Suez Canal Company to the British government for £3,976,582 to address severe debt.

Unable to raise further loans, Isma'il Pasha sold the Egyptian and Sudanese shares in the Suez Canal Company in 1875. The transaction, assisted by Yacoub Cattaui, was completed for £3,976,582, equivalent to approximately £4 million. This sale marked the beginning of direct intervention by Great Powers in Egypt.

Sources

Isma'il Pasha of Egypt Wikipedia, revision of 2026-09-15
Suez Canal Wikipedia, revision of 2026-09-11

Machine-drafted from the cited Wikipedia passages and checked by a reviewing model, not by a human editor. Every passage cites the revision it was written from; dates and places follow those passages.