The World Bank has suggested a number of measures to address Pakistan’s chronic fiscal deficits, including a cut to the funding of projects that now fell within the provinces’ domain. Briefing journalists, the World Bank’s senior macroeconomist Derek Chen said the federal government was still spending around Rs328bn every year on federal ministries devolved to the provinces around 15 years ago.
In a significant development, the National Tax Council (NTC) on Wednesday approved the much-awaited Place of Provision of Service Rules (PPSRs), a step towards harmonising general sales tax on services across the country and ultimately easing the doing of businesses. Harmonising GST on services is a condition of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to unlock funding to Pakistan stalled since D
Pakistan’s economy is in a tailspin, going from crisis to catastrophe and now the system is becoming unhinged, warns Pakistani-American economist Atif Mian. Mr Mian, a professor of economics at the prestigious Princeton University and the first Pakistani to rank among the 25 top economists of the world, blames “judiciary, politicians, and generals” for this situation. “The last couple of yea
Share prices rose initially on Monday, but pessimism soon overpowered the bulls and drove down the representative index of the Pakistan Stock Exchange. Arif Habib Ltd said a lack of investors’ involvement pushed the index into the red territory soon after the opening bell rang. Trading remained subdued for the rest of the session with prices swinging in both directions before closing on the low
High oil prices, massive drop in auto sales, low power generation and economic slowdown restricted the country’s overall oil products sales which declined by nine per cent in March and 21pc during the first nine months of the current fiscal year (9MFY23). According to Nasheed Malik of Topline Securities, this is the lowest monthly sales figure in 35 months, since February-April 2020. Oil sal