Currency dealers offer $24b in loans to Pakistan to stay away from IMF package

Islamabad: Currency dealers in open market in Pakistan have offered loans of $24 billion to the government for the next two years to help it stay away from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) programme, which has badly hit the nations economy.

Exchange Companies Association of Pakistan (ECAP) President Malik Bostan said: “We have offered $1 billion a month in financing to the government for the next two years to get rid of the IMF,” The Express Tribune reported.

The government must pass an order to allow exchange companies to borrow US dollars directly from overseas Pakistanis, foreign firms and global exchange companies, he emphasised.

The loans will be free of cost and can be rolled over, if required.

“We are in contact with millions of expatriate Pakistanis as they are our clients. They are ready to lend $1 billion a month to us (exchange companies) over the next 24 months, in addition to the usual inflows received by exchange companies.”

Bostan, along with other office-bearers of the association, floated the proposal in a meeting with Senate Standing Committee on Finance Chairman Saleem Mandviwala in Islamabad, The Express Tribune reported.

Central bank officers and other high officials were present in the huddle.

“Exchange companies are already supplying $300-400 million a month, totalling $4 billion a year, to the inter-bank market,” he revealed, adding that the IMF had continued to come up with new conditions one after another, making it tough for Pakistan to give a push to its economy.

He asked the government to further review its laws, rules and regulations for IT freelancers, who had deposits of billions of dollars in foreign banks. “If the regulations are softened, they will bring these deposits to Pakistan.”