The foreign exchange reserves held by the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) decreased by $59 million on a weekly basis, as reported by data released by the SBP. As of September 22, the SBP’s foreign currency reserves stood at $7.637 billion, reflecting a decline from the previous week’s figure of $7.695 billion. The central bank attributed this decrease in reserves to debt repayments.

When considering the overall liquid foreign currency reserves of the country, including net reserves held by banks other than the SBP, the total amounted to $13.162 billion, representing a decrease of $25 million compared to the previous week. Among these reserves, net reserves held by banks reached $5.525 billion, showing an increase of $34 million during the week.

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Arif Habib Limited noted that the current level of reserves is sufficient to cover approximately 1.6 months of imports. It’s worth mentioning that the SBP’s reserves have declined by over $1 billion since July 14, when they stood at $8.727 billion.

In response to the declining reserves, Interim Finance Minister Dr. Shamshad Akhtar announced a government target of increasing SBP reserves to $12 billion by June 2024. Notably, last week, the central bank’s reserves saw a slight increase of $56 million, breaking a streak of four consecutive declines.