Dar’s meeting with SBP officials, currency dealers strengthen rupee

The meeting of Finance Minister Ishaq Dar with officials of the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) and currency dealers has proved fruitful as the rupee opened the new week strongly during the intraday trading.

The rupee showed a gain of Rs1.87 against the US dollar on Monday and was trading at 220.60. It had closed at 222.47 in the last week.

According to analysts, the rupee will trade range bound during this week. They have also termed the meeting of the Finance Minister and the SBP officials and exchange companies as important as the market confidence has shown improvement.

Earlier, Ishaq Dar had warned of strict action against those who would be found manipulating the exchange rate. Warning the ones involved in currency speculation and hoarding the Finance Minister had predicted that the rupee would start to appreciate against the greenback.

He had said, ““Where the rupee is at the present is not the right place. The rupee should trade between 180 and 200 to the dollar in the currency market.”

On the other side, the Ministry of Finance in its Economic Update and Outlook for October 2022 has also said that for the future path of inflation, the exchange rate is of utmost importance.

Globally, the US dollar had advanced on Monday after strong consumer spending data pointed to persistent underlying inflation pressure, cooling bets that the US Federal Reserve could signal a slowdown in its aggressive monetary policy tightening campaign.