News

Rampant commodity speculation

The print and electronic media is highlighting the upward revision in prices of petroleum products by mentioning that the current level of prices has set a record. Some commentators are of the opinion that the prices may cross Rs200 per litre in the days to come, which implies that many people are bullish about them. When prices are going up, the people tend to think that they will increase fur

Focus on improving productivity

My previous article, titled “Need for export-oriented strategies”, highlighted the low level of exports as a percentage of GDP in Pakistan and the importance of improving global and regional integration. Pakistani producers must become more productive to achieve sustainable growth in exports. This will help address the external account challenges and escape from the vicious cycle involving a ba

Focus on improving productivity

My previous article, titled “Need for export-oriented strategies”, highlighted the low level of exports as a percentage of GDP in Pakistan and the importance of improving global and regional integration. Pakistani producers must become more productive to achieve sustainable growth in exports. This will help address the external account challenges and escape from the vicious cycle involving a ba

Arresting the soaring trade deficit

The robust increase in exports is often regarded as one of the biggest achievements of the government by different ministers, and rightly so. But the positive impact of double-digit increase in exports is being offset by the surge in imports. In fiscal year 2018-19, when the current PTI government came to power, Pakistan recorded exports of $22.96 billion, as per data of the Pakistan Bureau of

Raast: can we bank on it?

Over the past year, we have all been bored to death of listening to that tech dudebro in our circle telling us about the impending fintech revolution in Pakistan. You probably have heard it all: from the outlandish ones predicting a crypto future with no place for fiat to how startups will dethrone existing financial services providers once Raast, the central bank’s real-time micropayments gate