Pakistan posts another $619m current account surplus in March

April 22, 2024 (MLN): Pakistan has recorded a current account surplus of $619 million in March 2024 largely due to a significant increase in workers' remittances, the latest data issued by the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) revealed today.

This is the highest monthly current account surplus since February 2015.

Last month, the country recorded a current account surplus of $98m, while in March, 2023 the current account surplus stood at $537m.

Moreover, on a cumulative basis, the current account deficit in 9MFY24 was recorded at $508m, showing an improvement of 87.5% YoY when compared to the deficit of $4.05bn in 9MFY23.

Total exports rose by 4.6% YoY to $3.23bn compared to $3.09bn in the same month of last year, while rose by 2.1% MoM as against the exports of $3.16bn in the previous month.

Total imports rose by 7.9% YoY and 3.7% MoM to $5.25bn as compared to the imports worth $4.86bn recorded in March of last year and $5.06bn recorded in February.

Accordingly, the trade deficit in goods and services rose 13.7% YoY to $2.02bn. On a monthly basis, it widened 6.4%.

Breaking up the data, the trade deficit in goods was $1.93bn, up 11.2% YoY and 6.2% MoM.

This was on the back of a 4.0% YoY rise in exports and a 7.0% YoY rise in imports.

Furthermore, the trade deficit in services was $89m, up 128.2% YoY compared to a deficit of $39m a year earlier, while it rose 12.7% MoM compared to a deficit of $79m a month earlier.

The data further details that the workers' remittances in March increased by 16.4% YoY to $2.95bn as against $2.54bn in March 2023; while on a monthly basis, the remittances went up by 31.3% MoM as compared to $2.25bn in the previous month.

Cumulatively in 9MFY24, workers' remittances were recorded at $21.04bn as compared to $20.85bn in 9MFY23, depicting a rise of 0.9% YoY.

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