News

Govt waits for IMF nod after revising budget

After revising the budget in line with International Monetary Fund’s demands, the government expects a breakthrough announcement from the global lending agency over the next few days to get direly needed bailout funds. “Almost all the irritants between the IMF staff and the Ministry of Finance were addressed hours before the finance minister’s wind-up speech on Saturday,” an official said, addi

Stocks move south on dearth of positive triggers

Stock prices oscillated within a narrow band as a lack of triggers failed to excite investors on Thursday. Arif Habib Ltd said the index of representative shares began the day in the green zone but dropped to the red territory in range-bound trading owing to the absence of economic triggers. Investors’ participation remained sideways in the wake of a delayed deal with the International Monet

WB, IMF take steps to boost crisis financing

The World Bank will ease financing for countries hit by natural disasters, it said on Thursday, as the International Monetary Fund announced it had hit its target of making $100 billion in special drawing rights available for vulnerable nations. The two announcements were made at a gathering in Paris of some 40 leaders, including about a dozen from Africa, China’s prime minister and Brazil’s pr

Lucky reclassifies Rs116bn reserves

Lucky Cement Ltd said on Thursday it’ll reclassify Rs116 billion from its revenue reserves to separate capital reserves — which aren’t distributable by way of dividend — to reflect their nature “more accurately”. Set aside to pay future obligations, reserves are retained earnings of a company and appear on its balance sheet as liabilities. As opposed to capital reserves that are meant for fi

Tax net to be expanded, Dar assures FPCCI

Finance Minister Ishaq Dar has agreed in principle to remove some of the anomalies in the finance bill to address the business community’s apprehensions, the Federation of Pakistan Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FPCCI) claimed on Thursday. Irfan Iqbal Shaikh, the FPCCI chief, said Mr Dar had promised to look into a list of anomalies presented to him by FPCCI on income tax, withholding tax,