Islamabad: Governor of the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP), Mr. Jameel Ahmad, recently discussed Pakistan’s economic achievements and optimistic future with international rating agencies and global investors at events hosted by major financial institutions like Standard Chartered and JP Morgan. These meetings occurred alongside the 2024 IMF-World Bank annual gatherings.
According to State Bank of Pakistan, Mr. Ahmad provided a detailed overview of Pakistan’s economic status, noting significant improvements in various economic indicators over the past year, underpinned by a robust monetary policy and governmental fiscal efforts aimed at macroeconomic stabilization. He emphasized the current economic trajectory as promising, marked by declining inflation rates and strengthening foreign exchange reserves.
Mr. Ahmad highlighted the challenges that still confront global and emerging economies, including Pakistan. He pointed out the essential yet stringent policy measures adopted to navigate these difficulties, which have started to bear fruit. He detailed the inflation rate’s peak at 38 percent in May 2023 and its subsequent decline to 6.9 percent year-on-year by September 2024, reflecting a broad-based disinflation process.
The Governor also underlined the substantial improvement in the external account over the last year. Despite increased imports and normalized profit repatriations by foreign investors, the external current deficit has considerably narrowed. This was largely due to strong growth in exports and remittances, which contributed to the improvement of the current account balance and helped boost the SBP’s foreign exchange reserves from US$3.1 billion in January 2023 to US$11 billion as of mid-October 2024. Furthermore, the SBP aims to elevate its reserves to US$13 billion by the end of June 2025.
Looking forward, Mr. Ahmad reiterated the importance of continued structural reforms, supported by new programs with the IMF and other partnerships. He shared plans for the 2024-2028 period focusing on price stability, reserve accumulation, and fostering an inclusive digital financial ecosystem, which is part of the SBP’s strategy to enhance the overall efficiency and stability of the financial sector.