KARACHI: The State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) has reported that the county’s current account deficit shrank by 4.5 per cent or $88 million to over $1.86 billion on YoY in first eight months (July-February) of current fiscal year.
The current account deficit amounted to $1.95 billion in the same period of the preceding fiscal year. The country’s current account balance was in surplus, however, during the last month alone. It clocked up at $157 million in February as opposed to a deficit of $590 million in January.
As a percentage of the gross domestic product (GDP), the current account deficit decreased from 1.1% in the preceding fiscal year to 0.9% in Jul-Feb.
Pakistan’s total imports of goods in Jul-Feb were valued at $26.3 billion as opposed to $27.9 billion in the same eight months of the preceding fiscal year, which shows an annual decrease of 5.7%.
Pakistan exported goods worth over $14.4 billion in Jul-Feb as opposed to the exports of goods valuing almost $16 billion in the same period of the last year, reflecting an annual decline of 9.9%. Not only Pakistan’s exports are declining, their rate of decline is higher than the corresponding decrease in imports, the SBP data shows.
