Pakistan suffers greatly from financial exclusion. The total individual lending by all providers, including commercial banks, microfinance banks, and non-bank financial institutions (NBFIs), is approximately 15 million in a country of 225m. This is staggeringly low. The biggest culprits are the commercial banks. While the commercial bank industry is hugely profitable, the earnings are generated
As the United States and China wage an all-out trade war — with escalating tariffs, strategic retaliations, and an economic standoff that reverberates globally — the impact on Pakistan is both profound and potentially existential. For a nation burdened by a fragile economy, geopolitical dilemmas, and longstanding structural inefficiencies, these global shifts introduce challenges that are far m
The telecom sector in Pakistan is facing a wide range of taxation, pricing, and regulatory challenges impacting its growth, sustainability, and competitiveness. Some of these issues also extend into related sectors, such as solar infrastructure and local manufacturing, and together, they affect the broader business landscape in the country. One of the main challenges is the change in the Advanc
If Trump has his way, the United States will lose its global influence, standards of living of Americans will decrease, including for those who supported him, and the world will not be safer, more secure or more prosperous.” This is the considered view of Nobel Prize winner Joseph E. Stiglitz as expressed in his latest book ‘Globalisation and its Discontents Revisited: Anti-globalisation in the Er
Last Friday, China raised tariffs on US goods to 125 per cent to match the import levies slammed by President Donald Trump on its exports as the world’s two largest economies took turns putting trade barriers against each other. But Beijing said it would ignore further levies by President Donald Trump because it no longer makes economic sense for importers to buy from America, dismissing Trump’s m