{"id":34572,"date":"2023-12-12T12:49:01","date_gmt":"2023-12-12T12:49:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/sbp-maintains-interest-rate-at-22pc\/"},"modified":"2023-12-12T12:49:01","modified_gmt":"2023-12-12T12:49:01","slug":"sbp-maintains-interest-rate-at-22pc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/sbp-maintains-interest-rate-at-22pc\/","title":{"rendered":"SBP maintains interest rate at 22pc"},"content":{"rendered":"

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The State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) has decided to maintain the status quo and keep the key policy rate unchanged at 22 per cent to keep the aggregate demand in check, according to a press release issued on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe decision does take into account the impact of the recent hike in gas prices on inflation in November, which was relatively higher than the MPC\u2019s earlier expectation,\u201d the central bank explained after a meeting of the bank\u2019s Monetary Policy Committee (MPC).<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Committee viewed that this may have implications for the inflation outlook, albeit in the presence of some offsetting developments,
\nparticularly the recent decrease in international oil prices and improved availability of agriculture produce.\u201d<\/p>\n

In light of the recent development, the press release said, \u201cthe current monetary policy stance is appropriate to achieve the inflation target of 5-7 percent by end-FY25.\u201d<\/p>\n

The decision to keep the interest rate unchanged was anticipated and at par with several analysts\u2019 expectations. A report by Topline Securities showed that 63pc<\/a> of key market players expected no change in the key rate.<\/p>\n

Previously, Pakistan Bureau of Statistics data showed<\/a> inflation in November hit another another high of 29.2<\/a>, a slight increase from October but well below a peak of 38pc in May. The two major factors behind the hike were noted to be gas prices, which have jumped by 520pc in the month of November, and electricity rates.<\/p>\n

Moreover, the country faces a long and winding road to economic recovery under the $3 billion loan programme<\/a>, approved by the IMF in July. The programme, although helped saving the country from default, has stringent conditions aimed at curbing inflationary pressure.<\/p>\n

The SBP policy rate was raised to an all-time high of 22 per cent<\/a> in June and has stayed unchanged for the last three review meetings.<\/p>\n

Additionally, the State Bank\u2019s foreign exchange reserves dropped by $237 million to $7 billion in the week ending Dec 1, the central bank said in a statement, as debt servicing on foreign loans continue to eat up SBP\u2019s holdings.<\/p>\n

The World Bank\u2019s regional vice president for South Asia, Martin Raiser, recently said in an address to economists that Pakistan\u2019s economy was stuck in a low-growth trap with poor human development outcomes and increasing poverty.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) has decided to maintain the status quo and keep the key policy rate unchanged at 22 per cent to keep the aggregate demand in check, according to a press release issued on Tuesday. \u201cThe decision does take into account the impact of the recent hike in gas prices on […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":34573,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/i.dawn.com\/large\/2023\/12\/111327072a81fae.jpg?r=132912","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[192],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-34572","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-islamabad-news"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34572","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34572"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34572\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/34573"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34572"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34572"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34572"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}