April 07, 2022 (MLN): Maintaining its losing streak, the sliding Pakistani rupee (PKR) witnessed a massive fall of two rupees on Thursday in the interbank market as the currency closed the trade at 188.18 against the greenback, compared to the previous close of PKR186.13 per USD.
While enduring a gloomy session, PKR traded in a range of 2.85 rupees per USD showing an intraday high bid of 189 and an intraday low offer of 186.45.
Speaking to Mettis Global, Zafar Paracha President of Exchange Companies Association of Pakistan (ECAP) emphasized that the import of luxury items should be banned at the earliest as the local unit is under a free fall.
Under this deteriorating economic scenario and political upheaval, the authorities should declare an economic emergency in the country and take mindful steps to address the wave of prevailing uncertainties, he stressed.
Meanwhile, Ali Khizar, an Independent Economist is of the view, “Everyone is looking to buy- importers are buying dollars and exporters are holding. Everyone is trying to buy.”
“There is no government. There is no confidence,” he added.
He also underlined the need for the IMF program and a surge in petroleum prices in order to address the ongoing crisis.
At the same time, the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) of the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) has increased the policy rate by 250 basis points considering the challenges faced by the economy.
“This strong and proactive policy response was necessitated by deterioration in the outlook for inflation and increase in risks to external stability since the last meeting,” SBP said in a statement.
From July’21 to date, the local unit has lost Rs30.63 against the USD. Similarly, the rupee fell by Rs11.66 in CYTD, with the month-to-date (MTD) position showing a decline of 2.50%, as per data compiled by Mettis Global.
During the last 52 weeks, PKR lost 19.08% against greenback, reached its lowest at 188.17 today and touched its high of 152.27 on May 7, 2021.
Furthermore, the local unit has weakened by 11.49% since its high on April 08, 2021, against EUR while, it has dropped by 14.97% against GBP since its high on April 09, 2021.
In addition, the performance of PKR remained bleak against major currencies during the month to date as it depreciated by 2.52%, 2.50%, 2.24%, 2.23%, 1.56%, 0.64%, and 0.18% against SAR, AED, GBP, CNY, CHF, JPY and EUR, respectively.
Within the open market, PKR was traded at 189/191 per USD.
Meanwhile, the currency lost 3.3 rupees to the Pound Sterling as the day's closing quote stood at PKR 246.55 per GBP, while the previous session closed at PKR 243.23 per GBP.
Similarly, PKR's value weakened by 2.3 rupees against EUR which closed at PKR 205.11 at the interbank today.
On another note, within the money market, the overnight repo rate towards the close of the session was 10.00/10.25 percent, whereas the 1-week rate was 10.05/10.15 percent.
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