The capital market rebounded on Friday, following two consecutive sessions of losses, signaling a recovery in investor confidence. <\/p>\n
Fresh buying momentum emerged as investors capitalised on value opportunities after a prolonged spell of heavy selling.<\/p>\n
The Pakistan Stock Exchange\u2019s (PSX) benchmark KSE-100 Index rose by 1,246.93 points, or 1.13%, during early trading, reaching an intraday high of 111,670.25.<\/p>\n
\u201cMarket is rebounding after declining for two sessions. Seems profit-taking\/correction is done for the time being,\u201d said Samiullah Tariq, Head of Research at Pak-Kuwait Investment Company.<\/p>\n
The rally came amid notable economic updates and policy announcements. Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) Chairman Rashid Mahmood Langrial revealed a staggering Rs7.1 trillion tax gap, with Rs2.4 trillion attributed to income tax shortfalls.<\/p>\n
Concurrently, Finance Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb reiterated the government\u2019s commitment to increasing the tax-to-GDP ratio from 9-10% to 13.5% . The Tax Laws (Amendment) Bill, 2024 aims to impose stricter restrictions on non-filers, barring them from acquiring high-value assets like vehicles over 800cc and expensive properties or conducting large financial transactions.<\/p>\n
Despite these policy developments, external economic pressures persist.<\/p>\n
The State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) reported a $228 million decline in foreign exchange reserves, reducing the total to $11.85 billion as of December 20, with combined reserves, including commercial banks, dropping by $261 million to $16.372 billion.<\/p>\n
However, this marks a substantial improvement from the dangerously low levels of $2.9 billion in February 2023, supported by a $200 billion rate cut by the SBP that strengthened macroeconomic fundamentals.<\/p>\n
Trade and investment data also provided encouraging signs of economic resilience. Exports rose by 12.57% to $13.691 billion during the first five months of FY2024-25, compared to $12.162 billion in the same period last year. Exports to the EU and the broader Asian region totaled $4.8 billion each, while shipments to the US, Pakistan\u2019s largest trading partner, increased by 14% to $2.4 billion.<\/p>\n
Conversely, exports to China declined by 14%. Significant growth was recorded in exports to the UAE and Afghanistan, which surged by 35% and 42%, respectively. Foreign direct investment (FDI) also increased by 31% year-on-year to $1.124 billion during the same period, with $219 million recorded in November.<\/p>\n
Other macroeconomic indicators reflect positive momentum. Pakistan recorded a current account surplus of $729 million in November, the largest in a decade, reversing the $148 million deficit recorded in November 2023. Over the first five months of FY2024-25, the current account surplus reached $944 million, a sharp turnaround from the $1.67 billion deficit recorded during the same period last year.<\/p>\n
Additionally, the country\u2019s credit default swap (CDS) spreads have tightened by 88%, indicating reduced credit risk and improved investor confidence.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The capital market rebounded on Friday, following two consecutive sessions of losses, signaling a recovery in investor confidence. Fresh buying momentum emerged as investors capitalised on value opportunities after a prolonged spell of heavy selling. The Pakistan Stock Exchange\u2019s (PSX) benchmark KSE-100 Index rose by 1,246.93 points, or 1.13%, during early trading, reaching an intraday …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":62477,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-74766","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74766","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=74766"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74766\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":74784,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74766\/revisions\/74784"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/62477"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=74766"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=74766"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=74766"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}