Karachi December 15 2022: SBP foreign exchange reserves for the week ending December 9 2022, were decreased by USD 15 million to USD 6,700 million as per data released by the Central Bank.
All debt repayments are on track and country’s foreign exchange reserves are expected to increase in second half of the current fiscal year, said Governor State Bank of Pakistan (SBP), Jameel Ahmad.
He said, for the fiscal year 2023, around $33 billion were to be repaid to external stakeholders, including the Current Account Deficit (CAD) of $10 billion and $23 billion in loan repayments.
Out of the payable $23 billion external debt, Pakistan has already repaid more than $6 billion whereas as a bilateral loan of $4 billion has been rolled over with the cooperation of relevant countries.
Another $8.3 billion maturing obligations are expected to be rolled over as discussions are underway. The remaining outstanding repayment stands around $4.7 billion for the remainder of this fiscal year. This includes $1.1 billion in commercial loans that have to be paid to foreign banks and $3.6 billion in multilateral loans.
At present, SBP reserves stand at the level of USD 6,700 million as of 9th December 2022, compared to USD 6,714 million at the end of the week ending 2nd December 2022.
During the same period, foreign exchange reserves held by commercial banks increased by USD 3 million to the level of USD 5,870 million as of 9th December 2022.
Overall reserves held by the country witnessed decrease of USD 12 million to USD 12,570 million during the week ended 9th December 2022.
