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Currency: Rupee strengthens against dollar

Market rumours suggest the move is part of IMF’s conditions for another much-needed bailout package

Our Correspondent December 14, 2017

A currency dealer counts Pakistani rupees and US dollars at his shop in Karachi PHOTO: REUTERS

KARACHI: The rupee strengthened against the dollar at Rs110.52 in the inter-bank market on Wednesday compared with Tuesday’s close of 110.64. In the last four days, the rupee has cumulatively shed over 4.86% of its value after the central bank reportedly abstained from intervening in response to pressures being built up due to a widening current account deficit. The State Bank of Pakistan has maintained that the slide in the rupee’s value is due to supply and demand dynamics of foreign exchange in the inter-bank market.

‘Currency closer to equilibrium’ as rupee hits record low

While it has promised prompt interventions in case of ‘speculative or momentary pressures’, the central bank will sit on the fence and let “market-driven adjustment in the exchange rate to continue to contain the imbalance in the external account and sustain a higher growth trajectory”, according to a presser issued on Friday. Market rumours suggest the move is part of IMF’s conditions for another much-needed bailout package.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 14^th, 2017.

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