Day: November 6, 2021

Virtual Remittance Gate (VRG) World has won its legal battle against Digital Bridge as the Sindh High Court (SHC) has allowed it to continue providing services to various clients for the Asaan Mobile Scheme.

Digital Bridge had sued VRG World for not meeting the standard criteria prescribed by the authorities and claimed that it should not be allowed to operate.

Digital Bridge claimed that the authorities had not allowed it to commence its operation although it had fulfilled the requirements besides making handsome investments so that the other operator may gain the advantage in the market in its absence.

VRG World stated that it had also fulfilled all the requirements, including an 11-step process and that it had maintained the paid-up capital of Rs. 200 million as the mandatory regulatory requirement.

On the other hand, Digital Bridge had failed to maintain the prescribed limit of the paid-up capital that was merely Rs. 10 million.

The SHC has allowed VRG World to continue its operations and has dismissed Digital Bridge’s case against it.

The legal battle between the two operators is part of their commercial rivalry that goes back a couple of years to when they were awarded licenses.

The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) and the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) had issued two Third Party Service Provider (TPSP) licenses to VRG (Pvt.) Ltd. and Digital Bridge (Pvt.) Ltd. (DBL) in 2018 to bring the unbanked population into formal banking service.

The telecommunication watchdog had rebuffed VRG last year for running an ill-intended campaign in a section of the media to malign the regulator and influence regulatory decisions.

The PTA claimed that it had fully facilitated the TPSP licensees through a series of meetings and discussions to resolve the technical and financial issues between all the stakeholders over several months. However, instead of recognizing the efforts of the PTA, VRG had tried to malign it by publishing misinformation.

The PTA had then objected in a statement, claiming that VRG had slandered it for favoring Digital Bridge to put pressure on the former well before the 30 days notice for processing of commencement certificate that ended on 4 September 2020.

Source: Pro Pakistani

The Pakistani Rupee (PKR) maintained its position against the US dollar (USD) on Friday to close at 170.01.

Yesterday, the rupee broke its 6-day winning streak against the greenback and lost 4 paisas in the inter-bank market to close at Rs. 170.01.

The PKR traded between Rs. 170.12 to the USD and Rs. 169.85 to the USD on Thursday before closing at Rs. 170.01 to the USD, as compared to Wednesday’s (November 3) closing at Rs. 169.97.

The rupee maintained its stride against the dollar as reserves held by the central bank increased by 0.3 percent or $53 million to $17.199 billion. The reserves of commercial banks dropped to $6.726 billion from $6.787 billion. It bears mentioning that Pakistan’s foreign exchange reserves have slightly fallen to $23.926 billion in the week that ended October 29 from $23.934 billion, the State Bank of Pakistan stated on Thursday.

The former Treasury Head of Chase Manhattan Bank, Asad Rizvi, explained on Twitter that the net forex reserve was up by $53 million, even though “The updated data did not include [the] $3 billion Saudi deposit, probably it will be shown in next week’s update after receiving the credit in SBP account.”

“PKR is expected to take a breather due to [the] weekend in M/E”, he added.

The local currency lost 11 paisas against the Euro, gained 63 paisas against the Canadian Dollar (CAD), and 67 paisas against the Australian Dollar (AUD).

It also appreciated by Rs. 2.36 against the Pound Sterling (GBP).

In contrast, it remained stable against the Saudi Riyal (SAR) and the United Arab Emirates Dirham (AED).

Source: Pro Pakistani

To achieve self-sufficiency in wheat, the government has decided to increase the minimum support price for wheat to Rs 1,950/40 kg compared to Rs. 1,800/40 kg last year. The Food Ministry hopes this will incentivize farmers to grow sufficient wheat to meet the national production target of 28.90 million mt.

Due to much higher international prices of DAP fertilizer and shipping costs, the domestic price (Rs. 7,300/bag) has also increased significantly. But, the price of urea (Rs. 1,850/bag) is stable and significantly lower than the international price (Rs. 5,400/bag) because the government provides Rs. 126 billion annual subsidy for natural gas.

The government is working closely with the fertilizer companies to ensure adequate availability of both key fertilizers during this Rabi season. Moreover, the government has provided over Rs. 16 billion for fertilizer, seed, pesticide, agricultural loan markup subsidies. These timely initiatives have helped generate record production of many commodities.

The ministry lauded the hardworking farmers, saying they have produced record crops this year. Pakistan has achieved the highest ever production of wheat (27.5 million mt), rice (8.4 million mt), maize (8.5 million mt), mung beans (0.275 million mt), onion (2.3 million mt), and potato (5.7 million mt), while sugarcane achieved the second-highest production (81 million mt).

In 2021-22, the sugarcane production is estimated at 87.67 million tons; 8% higher than that of last year. Rice production is estimated at 8.84 million tons which is 5% higher than that of last year. Maize production is estimated at 9.0 million tons which is 8.5% higher than that of last year while the cotton production as of 1 November 2021 is 6.2 million bales compared to 3.4 million bales (82% higher) at the same date last year.

Source: Pro Pakistani

The State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) has set a new deadline of June 30, 2022, for exchange companies to ensure the implementation of the Biometric Verification System (BVS).

A circular issued by SBP states, “All ECs/ECs-B categories are required to continue their coordination with the National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA) to ensure that the integrated system is implemented within the stipulated timeline of June 30, 2022.”

The SBP, on October 7, had restricted purchasing of dollars from the open market as biometric verification was made compulsory for all buying $500 or above.

The new instructions set by SBP required exchange companies to conduct biometric verification for transactions equal to and above $500 for all foreign currencies. The central bank had required the exchange firms to implant these requirements from October 22, 2021, however, due to a time taking process to attach the system with NADRA, the deadline could not be met.

To resolve this problem, SBP introduced biometric verification through e-Sahulat after the deadline of October 22. Due to the failure of the system connection with NADRA, the exchange companies are required to continue with biometric verification from November 5.

Due to the technical difficulties faced in the implementation of the BVS, NADRA offered an alternative android-based system. Till the development of the android-based BVS, the SBP has allowed the exchange firms to serve their customers using e-Sahulat.

Furthermore, the central bank stated that extensions and relaxations in the June 30, 2022 timeline will only be provided to companies that have genuine reasons as well as an explicit time-bound implementation plan.

Source: Pro Pakistani