Pak receives USD 556 million from IMF

Pakistan has received USD 556 million from the IMF as the fourth instalment of a loan approved last year to take the Cash-strapped country out of its economic woes.
The central bank in Pakistan confirmed it has received the fourth instalment of the USD 6.8 billion loan which was approved last year by the International Monetary Fund.
"The USD 556 million has been added to our foreign exchange reserves," a spokesman for the State Bank of Pakistan told PTI.
He said the instalment payment was part of the Extended Facility Fund (EFF) which was released by IMF after its team visited Pakistan and reviewed the economic reforms.

Pakistan's foreign exchange reserves stood at USD 7.8 billion before the EFF was approved but now they have doubled to USD 14.8 billion, the spokesman confirmed.
Financial analysts told PTI that despite the homegrown Taliban insurgency, Nawaz Sharif's government had taken measures to revive the economy and had also tried to resolve the energy crisis which is one of Pakistan's biggest problems.

On the first day of the new fiscal year, the State Bank had reported that monetary expansion was much lower than last year; borrowing for budgetary support was sharply low while private sector borrowing picked up pace.
According to a report issued by the State Bank, monetary expansion was 9.51 per cent compared to 15.9 per cent in Financial Year 2013. The report contains data up to June 20.

The details reveal that the government borrowing for budgetary support was just 20 per cent of what was borrowed in the last fiscal year.
Till June 20, government borrowing for budgetary support was Rs 268 billion while during the same period last year, it was Rs 1,294 billion. This was record low borrowing.
However, the government borrowing from State Bank was Rs 335 billion compared to Rs 403 billion in the same period last year.