The government announced on Monday that the annual inflation for 2023-24 exceeded its budgetary target, reaching a staggering 23.41 per cent owing to an increase in electricity, gas, and essential kitchen items. The projected target was 21pc for the outgoing fiscal year. According to data released by the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics on Monday, the average monthly inflation fluctuated over t
The country saw a record inflow of foreign investment in treasury bills during the last quarter of the financial year FY24, reflecting attractive returns and stability in the exchange rate. Pakistan suffered heavily after the outbreak of Covid in 2020 and almost entire investments in domestic bonds left the country. Since then foreign investors have remained away from t-bills and the long-term
A nationwide nominal Rs1 Point-of-Sale (PoS) service fee on each sale invoice collected by hundreds of thousands of tier-1 retailers translates into tens of billions of rupees annually and is allegedly misappropriated by tax officials. This fee, hardly noticed by customers, was imposed by the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) about four years ago. At the time of its imposition in August 2021, it w
Finance Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb has reiterated his commitment to strengthen the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) and its supporting initiatives to enhance revenue collection, digitisation and economic development. The minister expressed these views while chairing a meeting at the FBR headquarters on Monday to review the performance of the tax machinery. Chairman Zubair Tiwana and members of t
Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) traded in a narrow band in the outgoing week as investors were worried about the budget measures being debated in the National Assembly, which drove the KSE-100 index down by over 350 points. It came despite optimism over the impending approval of a new and larger International Monetary Fund (IMF) loan programme. It was an eventful week that marked the closure of f