Reserves on thin ice

This refers to the news report ‘Forex reserves rise to $16.385bln’ (July 6). The free reserves of the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) stand at $9.788 billion, which is barely enough to cover eight weeks of imports. The reserves are depleting at the rate of approximately $1 billion per month.By the time the new government takes office and settles down, the reserves would drop to the equivalent of mere six weeks of imports. The forgoing reserve position is after counting the inflow of funds from the recently-launched amnesty scheme. It seems that the country will require a long time to steer the ship of economy out of crisis.Erum A BaigKarachi

from The News International - Newspost https://ift.tt/2NrBcyZ