Another friendly country to confirm assurance this week: Miftah Ismail

According to Pakistan’s Finance Minister Miftah Ismail, “one friendly country” has confirmed its commitment to assist Pakistan in filling the funding gap, while another nation would confirm its assurance in a day or two.

An announcement will be made soon on this subject after confirmation.

Earlier, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) said that Pakistan has completed the final prior action for the combined seventh and eighth reviews with the increase in the petroleum development levy (PDL).

The IMF also stated that the board meeting is tentatively scheduled for late August once adequate financing assurances are confirmed.

In order to prevent Pakistan from having a liquidity vacuum following the IMF loan, the international lender wants to make sure Pakistan will be able to get $4 billion in additional cash.

The country has a $4 billion finance imbalance, according to Miftah, and the IMF wants our reserves to grow by $6 billion.

Pakistan is in touch with friendly nations to cover the gap, and one of them has already reaffirmed its assurance. Within a day or two, the other nation will confirm as well.

The assurances would be announced in advance of the IMF board meeting, which is slated to take place in the last week of August. According to reports, the IMF would announce the disbursement for Pakistan as soon as sufficient finance assurances are verified.

The import bill has decreased to $4.92 billion, according to the minister. Due to this, there is now more cash coming in than going out. The market attitude has improved as a result of this.

He believed that the Pakistani rupee had grown significantly versus the US dollar and would continue to do so.

The Pakistani rupee made a significant recovery on Wednesday, recording its largest day-over-day gain in absolute terms against the US dollar to settle at Rs228.8, up Rs9.58 or 4.19 per cent in the inter-bank market. In the early hours of Thursday, trade, the rupee kept rising.

On Thursday, stocks extended their gains, with analysts blaming the strong recovery of the rupee and soaring global equities for the optimistic trend.

Read more: Dollar may drop near Rs180 after IMF tranche

The benchmark KSE-100 index increased 356.50 points or 0.87 per cent to settle at 41,425.37 points, according to the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX).

After being battered for weeks due to political and economic unrest, the local currency recovered by Rs9.59 on Wednesday, marking the highest one-day rise in decades.