Most experts believe the central bank will leave the interest rate unchanged at 15 per cent in its next monetary policy meeting scheduled for Nov 25, a survey showed on Thursday. According to the survey, conducted by brokerage house Topline Research, 79 per cent of the participants expects no change in the policy rate in the upcoming monetary policy. Besides, around 16pc participants think the
The government has increased the markup on development loans and advances to the provincial, local bodies, state-owned enterprises (SOEs) and public sector financial institutions by almost one percentage point for the previous fiscal year, which ended on June 30. In a notification issued on Thursday, the finance ministry has fixed the markup rate for the 2021-22 fiscal year at 11.2 per cent, up
Pakistan and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) had another round of engagement on Thursday but could not finalise a schedule for formal talks on the overdue ninth review of a $7 billion loan programme amid a lack of clarity on flood-related financial requirements for this fiscal year and declining revenue stream in the wake of import controls. “Dates for the ninth review could not be finali
The equity market had another range-bound trading session on Wednesday as share prices succumbed to the selling pressure on the back of negative triggers. Topline Securities said equities took a downturn as Pakistan’s credit default swap (CDS) — insurance against a sovereign failure to pay back maturing debt — surged to a multi-year high of 75.5 per cent. The rise in the CDS weighed heavily on
Large-scale manufacturing (LSM) posted a negative growth of 0.4 per cent in the first quarter of the current fiscal year from a year ago, official data of the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics showed on Wednesday. The deceleration in industrial output in the current fiscal year indicates that economic growth will slip further in the next quarter. It is estimated that the second quarter will be more