CAIRO - Sales of Egyptian 182-day treasury bills surged to 51.85 billion Egyptian pounds ($1.75 billion) at an auction on Thursday from 2.64 billion pounds last week, as investors flooded back a day after the pound's latest sharp fall against the dollar.

Sales of 364-day bills jumped to 30.40 billion pounds from 3.75 billion pounds last week, according to central bank data.

The average yield on the 182-day bills climbed to 21.032% from 20.595%, while that on the 364-day bills rose to 21.520% from 20.886%, the central bank said.

The Egyptian pound weakened to as low as 32.20 to the dollar on Wednesday from 27.60 at the opening, but rebounded to 29.60 on Thursday. At the start of the year a dollar had fetched less than 25 pounds.

Egypt has been loosening a dollar peg in jumps, with a view to letting the currency float freely, as it promised the International Monetary Fund last October.

Bankers said there were signs of international institutions pouring money into Egypt ahead of the auction after having been largely absent since March, when the dollar still fetched less than 16 pounds.

It was the largest amount of 182-day bills to be sold at a single auction in over a year and the largest amount of 364-day bills since December.

Egypt has been suffering a shortage of foreign currency since the war in Ukraine hit tourism revenue, raised commodity import bills and led foreign investors to pull more than $20 billion out of the economy. The pound has lost about 51% of its value since March.

(Reporting by Patrick Werr; Editing by Aidan Lewis and Kevin Liffey)