The World Bank on Tuesday projected about four million people falling below the lower middle-income poverty line amid economic growth plummeting to just 0.4 per cent against a budgeted target of 5pc. Meanwhile, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) has forecast Pakistan’s economic growth plunging to 0.6pc from 6pc last year owing to the prevailing political crisis, flood-oriented economic losses, fo
The domestic debt of the central government has increased by Rs3 trillion during the first 8 months of the current financial year, reported the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) on Wednesday. The central bank data showed the stock of government debt rose to Rs34.071 trillion in February compared to Rs31.037tr in June 2022, an increase of 9.7 per cent. The central government’s domestic borrowings
Pak Suzuki Motor Company Ltd on Wednesday jacked up the car prices for the fourth time in the current calendar year. Without giving any reason in its circular issued to the dealers, Pak Suzuki raised the prices by Rs88,000-235,000 of various models from April 6. The new prices of Alto VX, VXR, VXR AGS and AGS models have been raised to Rs2.252 million, Rs2.612m, Rs2.799m and Rs2.935m, a rise
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