Islamabad, April 15, 2019: International Monetary Fund (IMF) mission is visiting Pakistan end of this month to finalize the size of bailout package.
While, briefing the National Assembly’s Standing Committee on Finance, Revenue and Economic Affairs here on Monday, Federal Finance Minister Asad Umar said that IMF bailout agreement is almost finalised and will share the agreement details once singed. However, he claimed that masses will not be impacted by the IMF bailout agreement.
Talking about the size of the bailout package, he said that IMF loan size will be finalized after the visit of IMF mission to Pakistan, which is scheduled by end of April 2019. “Most likely the bailout
“Following the IMF bailout Pakistan is most likely to receive funds from the World Bank and Asian Development Bank immediately”, he added.
Minister said that inflows from IMF, ADB and EB would ease off pressure on the country’s foreign exchange reserves, which surged to $10.5 billion level in March 2019 up from $6.6 billion in January supported by placement of funds by UAE and Chinese loan.
While, discussing Financial Action Task Force (FATF) deadline, he informed that President FATF Marshall Billingslea has assured that any decision relate to Pakistan would be taken on technical grounds instead of political.
Pakistan is sending details about the implementation on FATF’s recommendations on Monday and a delegation of FATF will visit Pakistan in May to review the implementation efforts to take a decision, he informed.
Minister said that Pakistan was facing a stiff time and even was unlabelled to make 15 days external payments, however now Pakistan is out of danger and the economy is on right track.
He said that Pakistan is facing highest ever deficits and Pakistan has to lay one billion dollar of Sukuk bond in December 2019. He also mentioned that Fund has not raised objection on new amnesty scheme.
