Amid talks over new loans, the International Monetary Fund said in a statement on Monday that its board had approved $1.1 billion in aid to Pakistan.
The money is part of a $3 billion standby agreement with the IMF that Islamabad obtained last summer to prevent the sovereign from defaulting on its debts. This is the second and final part of the agreement.
The permission came a day after Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif discussed the new loan program with IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva on the fringes of the World Economic Forum in Riyadh.
With the current standby agreement expiring this month, Islamabad is considering entering into a new long-term Extended Fund Facility (EFF) agreement with the fund.
Pakistan’s Finance Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb said Islamabad could win staff-level agreement on the new program by early July.
Islamabad said it was seeking a loan for at least three years to achieve macroeconomic stability and help carry out long-overdue and painful structural reforms.
Aurangzeb did not provide details of the amount the country is seeking.
Islamabad has not yet made a formal request, but the fund and the government are already in talks.
If secured, it will be Pakistan’s 24th IMF bailout.
The $350 billion economy faces a chronic balance of payments crisis and will have to repay nearly $24 billion in debt and interest next year, three times the central bank’s foreign exchange reserves. Equivalent to.
U.S. stocks ended higher on Monday, led by surges in Tesla and Apple, as investors awaited the Federal Reserve’s policy meeting later this week and its interest rate outlook.
find us on youtube
subscribe
