Business

Foreign exchange: SBP’s reserves down to $14.704b

Total liquid foreign reserves held by the country stood at $19,746.3 million

Our Correspondent November 13, 2015

PHOTO: AFP

KARACHI:

Foreign exchange reserves held by the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) decreased 0.8% on a weekly basis on November 6, according to data released by the central bank on Thursday.

SBP’s liquid foreign exchange reserves decreased by $117 million to $14,704 million compared to $14,821 million in the previous week. The decrease in reserves is mainly attributed to the payments of $108 million on account of external debt servicing.

Total liquid foreign reserves held by the country, including net reserves held by banks other than the SBP, stood at $19,746.3 million. Three weeks ago, SBP-held reserves increased 13.4%, or $1,794 million, after the central bank received $505 million from the International Monetary Fund, $500 million as proceeds of the Pakistan International Bonds, $376 million under the Coalition Support Fund and $263 million as syndicate financing for the government.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 13^th, 2015.

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COMMENTS (2)

Gp65 | 9 years ago | Reply @Parvez: Pakistan barely has enough reserves for 4 months of imports and are quite insufficient for an economy Pakistan's size -especially one drpendent heavily in fuel imports for its energy. In September 2013 before IMF loan was signed, Pakistan had reserves to cover less than a month's imports. If Forex reserves had not been addressed, the load shedding would be much much worse than it is. Apart from the obvious impact on quality of life that would have, there is also a huge fallout it would have on employment. Most of the borrowings are at a highly concessional rate. I think Dar deserves more credit than he gets for forex management. On the other hand the optimism about how CPEC.will impact the economy is unreasonable considering the 17.5% dollar rate of return guaranteed by the Pakistan government to a project where most workers are going to be Chineae and demand to be paid a premium for working in Pakistan which they perceive as an insecure country - rightly or wrongly.

Parvez | 9 years ago | Reply Dar's philosophy of borrowing to build up foreign exchange reserves.......was and is disastrous.

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