Weekly Economic Roundup

April 05, 2020(MLN): The latest weekly roundup is here to update the financial and economic data releases as they provide a guide to keeping an eye on trends in the upcoming week.

• Pakistan's Forex Reserves decreased by USD 717.60 Million or 3.96% and the total liquid foreign reserves held by the country stood at USD 17,387.50 Million on Mar 27, 2020.

• The Weekly Sensitive Price Indicator (SPI) for the Combined Group decreased by 2.01% during the week ended Apr 02, 2020 while the SPI increased by 9.27% compared to the corresponding period from last year.

• Pakistan's trade deficit for 9 months (July-March) FY20 improved by 26.45% to stand at USD 17.36 billion against the deficit of USD 23.61 billion of the corresponding period last fiscal year.

• The non-government sector has borrowed another net sum of Rs.20.02 billion during the week ended March 20, 2020, which brings the cumulative net borrowing for ongoing fiscal year FY2020 to Rs.260.28 billion. The net borrowing as of prior week was recorded at Rs.240.26 billion.

• The government of Pakistan has acquired an additional debt of Rs.173.76 billion during the week ended March 20, 2020, which brings its total net borrowing for the ongoing fiscal year 2020 to Rs.595.19 billion. As of prior week, the government had borrowed a net sum of Rs.421.43 billion.

• The first day of April witnessed a 21% decline in the outflow of hot money from government debt securities, as the foreign investors extracted $47.63 million from T-bills on April 1, 2020, compared to $59.96 million in the previous session.

• Due to the continuous deterioration in economic conditions with the COVID-19 crisis across the globe, risk-averse investors fled with their hot money worth $1.77 billion net from government debt securities (T-bills and PIBs) during the month of March 2020.

• The foreign net outflow continued to increase to $76.53 on March 27, 2020 from Pakistan’s sovereign debt securities and equity as fears of a global recession over COVID-19 spread heightened risk aversion.

• Pak Rupee's Real Effective Exchange Rate Index (REER) increased by 0.77 percent in February 2020 to a provisional value of 97.20 from the revised value of 96.46 in January 2020.

• Pakistan's Yearly Inflation Rate (New Base 2015-16) in March 2020 was 10.24 percent compared to 12.40 percent in February 2020 and 8.60 percent in March 2019.

• Profits and dividends repatriated by Pakistani sectors during February 2020 stood at $27.3 million, showing a decrease of 75% as compared to the previous month and 64% as compared to the same period of last year.  

• The Central Development Working Party (CDWP) Monday approved two projects worth Rs 466.264 million and recommended four projects valuing Rs 133 billion to the Executive Committee of National Economic Council (ECNEC) for consideration.

• The Asian Development Bank (ADB) Monday approved a further $2 million grant to support the government of Pakistan’s efforts to combat the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic in the country.

• The Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority (OGRA) on Tuesday issued a price-revision notification of Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) for the month of April, as per notification, the authority has reduced the locally produced LPG price by Rs 462.78 per cylinder of 11.8 kilograms.

• The Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) of the Cabinet Monday approved the fiscal stimulus package of Rs. 1.2 trillion aimed at addressing the ongoing challenges that emerged due to COVID-19 (Coronavirus) outbreak.

• The sale and production of cars dipped by 43.37 percent and 45.83 percent respectively during eight months of the financial year 2019-20 compared to the corresponding period of last year.

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