Islamabad
\nThe All Pakistan Business Forum (APBF) has expressed concern over Pakistan\u2019s recent repayment of a $700 million Chinese commercial loan, which has reduced foreign exchange reserves to $15.5 billion, highlighting the delicate balance between debt servicing and maintaining economic stability.
\nAPBF President Syed Maaz Mahmood and Chairman Ibrahim Qureshi said while timely repayment demonstrates fiscal responsibility, the country must carefully manage its growing reliance on bilateral loans and multilateral assistance to avoid constraining future policy options.
\nThey noted that Pakistan\u2019s dependence on China, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, along with rising foreign remittances, has so far helped prevent a sovereign default.
\nHowever, the APBF leadership emphasized that such dependence cannot substitute for sustainable domestic revenue generation and structural reforms.
\nWith another $1 billion loan from China Development Bank maturing in June, they warned that preemptive repayment without securing refinancing could further pressure foreign exchange reserves.
\nSyed Maaz Mahmood said that commercial loans rose by $1.7 billion to $7.2 billion by the end of the last fiscal year, reflecting the high cost of external borrowing driven by Pakistan\u2019s low sovereign credit rating. He stressed that the government should prioritize concessional and long-term financing, including exploring opportunities in domestic debt markets, before resorting to short-term bilateral deposits. He highlighted that the recent short-term rollover of a $2 billion UAE deposit at a higher interest rate underscores the risk of relying on temporary liquidity injections.
\nIbrahim Qureshi warned that annual rollovers of $12.5 billion in cash deposits from China, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE are not a sustainable strategy. He urged the government to adopt a medium-term debt management framework, linking foreign borrowing to clear expenditure priorities and establishing contingency plans to safeguard critical reserves. Qureshi also recommended that the government strengthen coordination between the Ministry of Finance and the State Bank of Pakistan to monitor the timing and impact of repayments on FX levels, ensuring stability in the currency market.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Islamabad The All Pakistan Business Forum (APBF) has expressed concern over Pakistan\u2019s recent repayment of a $700 million Chinese commercial loan, which has reduced foreign exchange reserves to $15.5 billion, highlighting the delicate balance between debt servicing and maintaining economic stability. APBF President Syed Maaz Mahmood and Chairman Ibrahim Qureshi said while timely repayment demonstrates …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":65974,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-93769","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\/93769","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=93769"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93769\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":93782,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93769\/revisions\/93782"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/65974"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=93769"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=93769"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=93769"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}