Pak Rupee Halts Win Streak Against USD After Below-Par Bond Auction Dulls Market

The Pakistani rupee halted its winning streak against the US Dollar today after opening trade at 280 in the interbank market. It was largely stable against the greenback during intraday trade and hardly parried any movement throughout the session after briefly touching 280 at 12:55 PM. The interbank rate later dropped back to 279 before closing at the same level for the remainder of the day. Open market rates across multiple currency counters were stable in the 279-280 range today. At close, the PKR appreciated by 0.001 percent to close at 279.66 against the dollar today. Despite barely rising, the rupee closed in the green 7th day in a row today. On a fiscal year-to-date basis, it has so far appreciated by 2.25 percent. Overall, the rupee is down nearly Rs. 60 since January 2023. Since April 2022, it is down over Rs. 107 against the greenback. As per the exchange rate movements seen today, the PKR was stable against the dollar today. In a key development, Wednesday saw this week’s below-par domestic bond performance which convinced market players that the central bank might finally bring the benchmark policy rate below 22 percent coming Monday. The sentiment slowed market trends today while visits to currency counters halved compared to yesterday’s clock. This week’s T-bill auction saw a declining trend where the rate on the 3-month paper went down to 20.49 percent on Wednesday. Yields on the 6-month and 12-month papers dropped down to 20.4 percent and 20.2 percent, respectively. Besides the Rs. 102 billion debt raised via competitive bidding, the government raised Rs. 82 billion through non-competitive bids, taking the total amount raised during the auction to Rs. 185 billion. The PKR was green against some of the other major currencies in the interbank market today. It was stable against the UAE Dirham (AED) and the Saudi Riyal (SAR) and gained 45 paisas against the Australian Dollar (AUD) and Rs. 1.15 against the Canadian Dollar (CAD). Meanwhile, it lost 18 paisas against the British Pound (GBP) and 27 paisas against the Euro (EUR) in today’s interbank currency market.