Market News
Pakistan spy agency targets black market dollar trade to curb rupee slide - REUTERS
By Ariba Shahid
Summary
- Spy agency's deputy chief met exchange firms over rupee fall
- Move underscores armed forces' expanding economic role
- Open market dollar rate down one rupee after latest action
KARACHI, July 24 (Reuters) - A deputy chief at Pakistan's spy agency met with currency exchange firms this week amid a sharp slide in the rupee, leading to a crackdown on black market dollar trade, the head of the country's forex association told Reuters on Thursday.
The move, a demonstration of the military's growing role in managing the economy, marks the second such intervention, following a 2023 army clamp down that halted an earlier sharp plunge in the currency, helping stabilise the exchange rate until this month.
Currency dealers say the rupee is again under pressure as a result of dollar hoarding, cross-border smuggling, and banking restrictions that have driven demand to unregulated dealers offering quicker or better rates.
Faisal Naseer, a major general heading the internal security arm of the military's Inter-Services Intelligence, met with exchange firms this week, according to Malik Muhammad Bostan, chairman of the Exchange Companies Association of Pakistan.
Following the meeting, security forces, including the Federal Investigation Agency - a civilian security agency - began targeting illegal currency dealers, many of whom subsequently went underground, he said.
The open market dollar rate was down one rupee following the intervention, said Bostan, who credited the enforcement drive and a resulting improvement in t
