ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s finance chief has said the country was “close” to reaching a staff-level agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF), local media reported on Thursday.
In 2019, Pakistan reached an accord with the IMF for a three-year, $6 billion bailout package aimed at shoring up fragile public finances and strengthening a slowing economy.
Officials are engaged in a fresh round of talks for the release of a $1 billion tranche of the loan. The talks were scheduled to complete on October 15 but reached a deadlock.
“We are close,” Pakistani prime minister’s adviser on finance Shaukat Tarin told English-language daily The News in a message on Wednesday evening.
IMF’s resident representative for Pakistan, Teresa Daban Sanchez, said the IMF team remained engaged with Pakistani counterparts on moving forward their work agenda.
“We are looking forward to our continued discussions with the Pakistani authorities on the set of economic policies and reforms that could form the basis for the completion of the Sixth Review under the EFF,” she told The News.
In June, a similar round of talks between the two sides failed to bring agreement on conditions for the tranche.
Pakistan’s national currency on Wednesday hit another historic low of Rs173.47 against the US dollar amid uncertainty surrounding the ongoing IMF talks.
The central bank said the Pakistani rupee closed up by 0.40 percent at Rs173.47 against the greenback in the interbank market as compared to Rs172.78 at the close of last week.
The currency also depreciated in the open market where it was trading at Rs174 for buying and Rs174.50 for selling against the greenback, according to the Exchange Companies Association of Pakistan (ECAP).