US Dollar On Way To Hit Rs250 Again In Open Market As SBP Surrenders To IMF’s Condition:
US Dollar On Way To Hit Rs250 Again In Open Market As SBP Surrenders To IMF’s Condition
ISLAMABAD: The US dollar-rupee exchange rate appears on way to hit 250 rupees, once again, in the open market trading after the central bank announced lifting of restrictions imports from Jan 2, 2023.
The State Bank of Pakistan’s decision of relaxing imports with the start of New Year (2023) seems to be a strategy of the government to surrender to the harshest conditions of the IMF.
IMF wants market-driven dollar-rupee in Pakistan irrespective of the manipulative role of market-forces and its catastrophic impact on consumers and the national economy.
Meanwhile, in the inter-bank trading, the dollar-rupee exchange rate will gradually edge up to around 240 rupees in the coming days.
On Tuesday night (Dec 27), SBP announced lifting of curbs on essential imports and on Wednesday (Dec 28), the dollar-rupee parity surged close to 227 rupees in the inter-bank and 236 in the open market trading.
Earlier, the exchange rate of dollar to a rupee closed at 225.50 rupees on Tuesday.
Throughout Dec 2022, dollar-rupee value remained pegged to 224 rupees in the inter-bank and 228 to 230 in the open market because of the administrative control of the finance ministry and the central bank. Nonetheless, in last three working days, the exchange rate of dollar recorded an increase of Rs3 _ from 224 to 227 on Wednesday (Dec 28).
This strategy, nevertheless, ceased to exist with the SBP’s decision to relax imports and the rate of dollar-rupee witnessed almost one rupee gain in the inter-bank in a single day. In the open market, the exchange rate depends on the ambitions of the currency dealers.
In recent days, the gap between inter-bank and open market exchange rate of dollar versus rupee has increased to 10 to 12 rupees and it will further widen in the days ahead.
It may be noted that throughout the day, the dollar-rupee exchange rate is kept high and 30-40 minutes before the closing hours, the rate is dropped for ulterior purposes.
Interestingly, finance minister Senator Muhammad Ishaq Dar had promised with the people to throw back the US dollar to below 200 rupees, but now he has been holding responsible smuggling and hoarding for his failure to control the greenback.
It means neither the smuggling nor hoarding will ever be controlled and the people will continue to suffer with super inflation, depreciation of rupee, and lack of government’s interest in curbing artificial price-hike in the country.
During the past few days, we are seeing statements of the Prime Minister and finance minister wherein they are talking about ‘significance’ of the IMF programme. In simple words, the coalition government is again bowing out to the IMF’s conditions which will further hit hard the common people although ruling elite will remain the safe as they are getting everything free of cost.
