South Asia Investor Review

There is light at the end of the tunnel, and it is not an oncoming train. Pakistan's dollar reserves are climbing again and its currency stabilizing, after more than a year of monthly declines. The nation's foreign exchange reserves rose by $260 million to $10.21 billion in the week that ended on Jan. 24, according to the State Bank of Pakistan. This included $500 million Pakistan received from China to help build foreign reserves, said Syed Wasimuddin, chief spokesman for the Pakistan's central bank. Pakistan's foreign reserves hit a record high of $16.5 billion in October 2007 but fell to $6.6 billion in November, largely because of a soaring import bill. There has been a dramatic decline in the cost of imports such as oil during the last few months, spelling relief for Pakistan and other non-OPEC developing nations. The price of oil has dropped to about a quarter of what it was last summer. Pakistan signed a $7.6 billion loan agreement with the International Monetar...

In spite of cheaper valuations of Karachi stocks from shrinking price earnings multiples relative to other markets, foreign investors in Pakistan continue to be nervous. As soon as the trading range was revised to plus or minus 5%, many investors took advantage to sell their holdings Friday and pushed the KSE-100 down more than 4%. The decline continued this week as the KSE-100 index lost 265.84 to close at 11,695.82. Earlier in the morning, it opened at 11,961.66. This is a far cry from the peak of 15739.25 earlier this year. "The measures taken on Friday proved to be an exit strategy for foreign investors," Asad Iqbal, managing director at Ismail Iqbal Securities Ltd. told Business Recorder newspaper in Karachi. Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Razi-ur-Rehman believes the market has a liquidity crisis and he blamed the bearish trend in the equity market on the State Bank of Pakistan's (SBP) tight monetary policy, which has affected market liquidity. The State...