{"id":16762,"date":"2022-07-31T16:40:40","date_gmt":"2022-07-31T16:40:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/undergroundnews.co.uk\/?p=16762"},"modified":"2022-07-31T16:40:42","modified_gmt":"2022-07-31T16:40:42","slug":"rupee-to-see-improvement-in-next-two-weeks-miftah-ismail-says","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/undergroundnews.co.uk\/?p=16762&lang=en","title":{"rendered":"Rupee to see improvement &#8216;in next two weeks&#8217;, Miftah Ismail says"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>Mishaal Arshad C.M Underground News<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><strong>Efforts to reduce imports and an expected daily rise in incoming dollars will lead to reduced pressure on the rupee, says Miftah Ismail.<\/strong><\/li><li><strong>Says Pakistan bought petroleum products worth Rs3.8 million for which payment was made in July, which is why there was a lot of pressure on the rupee.<\/strong><\/li><li><strong>Ban will continue to remain, for now, on imported cars, mobile phones and home appliances, says finance minister.<\/strong><\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-cnvs-separator-id-1659285557667\"\/>\n\n\n\n<p>Finance minister Miftah Ismail on Sunday said that the Pakistani rupee, which has taken a beating against the US dollar in recent weeks, should see some improvement \u201cin the two weeks\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Ismail was addressing a press conference to speak about Pakistan\u2019s economic path forward.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cI really think \u2014 although I never like to speculate on the currency market \u2014 but I really think that the rupee\u2019s true value is far greater [than what it is right now],\u201d the finance minister said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>He explained that in the past two months, Pakistan had to part with \u201ca billion and another billion\u201d, which put pressure on the local currency.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Ismail said that Pakistan bought petroleum products worth Rs3.8 million for which payment was made in July, which is why there was a lot of pressure on the rupee.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThis month, the State Bank had to pay $800 million more compared to the country\u2019s inflows,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Ismail said that efforts will be geared towards more dollars coming in daily and fewer leaving the country next month. \u201cWith our efforts to reduce imports and InshaAllah, with the daily rise in incoming dollars versus a decline in outgoing units, there will be a surplus [of dollars],\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThis will lead to a reduced pressure [on the rupee] and the dollar\u2019s value against the rupee should then see a slight drop,\u201d the minister added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Ismail said that he has hope that the \u201cnext two weeks will InshaAllah be better\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>He cautioned, though, that although this is his view since he believes \u201cthe fundamentals are in Pakistan\u2019s favour\u201d, but \u201cspeculation and sentiments also play a role in this\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 id=\"import-ban\" class=\"wp-block-heading\">Import ban<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>The finance minister said that the Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) has recommended removing the ban on imports. If approved by the cabinet and signed off on by the prime minister, several items will no longer be banned. A ban will continue to remain, however, on imported cars, mobile phones and home appliances.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 id=\"current-account-to-go-into-surplus-in-a-year\" class=\"wp-block-heading\">\u2018Current account to go into surplus in a year\u2019<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Ismail said that the government aims to convert the current account deficit into surplus. \u201cIn the short term, we reduced imports and now over the next two to three months, we will increase exports,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 id=\"priority-only-to-save-pakistan-from-default\" class=\"wp-block-heading\">\u2018Priority only to save Pakistan from default\u2019<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>The finance minister, to a question on what the government plans to do to arrest the rising inflation, Ismail said: \u201cIt is the prime objective of every finance minister to curb inflation and focus on growth. My number one priority has never been to control inflation or to bring growth. My priority has only been to save Pakistan from default.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>To describe just how grave a situation the country could have fallen into before being \u201csaved\u201d, he spoke of Sri Lanka, which recently declared bankruptcy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The minister said: \u201cOf late, petrol in the country cost 90 rupees and was sold at 3,000 rupees in the black market, hospitals shut down due to medicines running out, women would stand in line for three days to get gas to power their stoves, and one had to queue up for 10 days to get petrol.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 id=\"pti-brought-country-to-brink-of-default\" class=\"wp-block-heading\">\u2018PTI brought country to brink of default\u2019<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>In criticism of the past rulers, Ismail said that the PTI-led government increased the country\u2019s debt by Rs20,000 billion or 79% in the last three years and nine months.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>He said that the incumbent government did \u201cnothing that would take the country to the brink of a default\u201d. \u201cWhat brought the country to this point was PTI; it was Imran Khan,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The finance minister said that when the PML-N government left power, the country\u2019s debt stood at $24,952.9. \u201cWhen we came back now, it had risen to around $45,000.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Faulting the PTI government for the existing current account deficit of the country, he said that \u201cthe policies of Shaukat Tareen and Imran Khan have a big hand\u201d in it. He added that the previous government was behind the country\u2019s \u201cfour biggest budget deficits\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThere wasn\u2019t one year that they could match the PML-N\u2019s tax-to-GDP ratio,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cWhen every single year you reduce tax collections and increase the budget deficit, then of course debt will mount,\u201d Ismail said, adding that this year, Pakistan will have to pay $4,000bn in interest payments alone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The finance minister acknowledged that a \u201cvery difficult\u201d budget was passed, attributing it to the above-mentioned factors.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mishaal Arshad C.M Underground News Efforts to reduce imports and an expected daily rise in incoming dollars will&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":16765,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"csco_singular_sidebar":"","csco_page_header_type":"","csco_appearance_grid":"","csco_page_load_nextpost":"","csco_post_video_location":[],"csco_post_video_location_hash":"","csco_post_video_url":"","csco_post_video_bg_start_time":0,"csco_post_video_bg_end_time":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[50,76,71,38],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-16762","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"category-important-news","9":"category-latest-news","10":"category-pakistan","11":"cs-entry","12":"cs-video-wrap"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/undergroundnews.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16762","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/undergroundnews.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/undergroundnews.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/undergroundnews.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/undergroundnews.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=16762"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/undergroundnews.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16762\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16766,"href":"https:\/\/undergroundnews.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16762\/revisions\/16766"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/undergroundnews.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/16765"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/undergroundnews.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=16762"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/undergroundnews.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=16762"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/undergroundnews.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=16762"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}