Pakistani rupee falls to yet another historic low against US dollar

KARACHI: The Pakistani rupee continued to tumble against the US dollar, breaching yet another important threshold of 196 in the interbank market to hit its weakest level on Tuesday, media reports said.

Maintaining its downturn for the eighth successive working day, the Pakistani rupee was being traded at Rs 195.74 against the greenback surpassing its last low, Geo News reported.

A persistent delay in the receipt of the next tranche of $1 billion from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) is mounting pressure on the rupee.

The situation is likely to remain uncertain for the local currency, Commodities Director Adnan Agar said as the local unit fell below 196-mark against the greenback during the trading session on Tuesday.

"If the government decides to remove subsidies on petroleum products, the rupee will bounce back," he said, adding that the local unit will remain within the range of 180-185.

Agar, however, added that if the government decided to dissolve the Assembly and move towards early elections, the situation for the already tumbling currency market will deteriorate.

Since the beginning of this fiscal year (July 1, 2021) to date, the rupee has collectively dropped by a massive 24.24 per cent (or Rs 38.2) compared to the previous fiscal year's close at Rs 157.54.