Business

Oil prices edged up on Monday after OPEC+ nations held their output targets steady ahead of a European Union ban and a price cap kicking in on Russian crude. At the same time, in a positive sign for fuel demand, more Chinese cities eased Covid-19 curbs over the weekend, though the partial easing in policies sowed confusion across the country on Monday. …

ISLAMABAD: Despite unprecedented hike in inter­national oil and gas prices and resultant incr­ease in import bill of two essential commodities, the two gas utilities have failed to control system losses against regulatory targets approved by the government. Over the last three years (2019-22), both the gas utilities — Sui Southern Gas Company Limited (SSGCL) and Sui Northern Gas Pipelines Limited …

After two years of unprecedented profitability, Pakistan’s textiles and clothing exports are facing a strong demand downturn as consumers tighten their belts in the US, Europe and other markets. But Pakistani textile manufacturers aren’t the only ones experiencing this gloomy situation; the orders in the world’s every garment exporting country, including China, India and Bangladesh, have been slowing because of …

KARACHI: Overall vegetable exports swelled by 90 per cent in quantity and 57pc in value during the first four months of the current fiscal year thanks to brisk potato shipments that have offset the declining trend in onion exports due to huge crop destruction in Sindh and Balochistan. The total vegetable exports stood at 378,826 tonnes during July-October fetching $107 …

KARACHI: With dollar-denominated loan repayments of $73 billion falling due in the next three years, the talk of a debt restructuring is gathering pace. From the incumbent finance minister to the former finance minister as well as an ex-governor of the central bank, influence-wielding voices are calling for restructuring Pakistan’s foreign public debt of roughly $99bn. Speaking to Dawn on Saturday, Topline Securities Associate Director …

ISLAMABAD: The Pakis­tan Medical Association (PMA) has warned that the country’s health delivery system is already in shambles and a shortage of medicines due to the non-opening of letters of credit (LCs) for the import of active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) or raw materials will take the situation from bad to worse. Through a press release on Saturday, the doctors’ representative …

KARACHI: Pakistan Yarn Merchants Association (PYMA) on Saturday warned the government that the imposition of a five per cent regulatory duty (RD) on the import of polyester filament yarn would devastate 800,000 power looms and render millions of people jobless. The association held a protest at the Karachi Press Club and rejected the Econ­omic Coordination Commit­tee’s (ECC) decision of levying …

KARACHI: Trading on the stock exchange commenced on a negative note in the outgoing week amid a surprising policy rate hike by the central bank, which increased the benchmark rate by 100 basis points to 16 per cent. The negative mood was reinforced by rising political noise. Arif Habib Ltd said the momentum briefly turned green after the State Bank …

MOSCOW: Russian oil output could fall by 500,000 to one million barrels per day (bpd) early next year after the European Union imposes a ban on seaborne imports from Monday, two sources at major Russian producers said. The estimate is at the lower end of market analysts’ forecasts of the combined impact of the ban and a proposed price cap …

KARACHI: Pakistan should seek the restructuring of entire dollar-denominated debt worth around $99 billion, said former finance minister Shaukat Tarin on Friday. Addressing a press conference, he said the government should go for across-the-board restructuring of foreign loans without any bias for or against bilateral/multilateral creditors. On becoming finance minister in October, Ishaq Dar had vowed to seek the rescheduling …