Monetary policy announcement on Friday

KARACHI: The State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) will unveil its monetary policy statement for the next two months on May 25 (Friday), the central bank said in a statement issued on Tuesday.

Analysts expect the SBP to maintain a status quo in the monetary policy at its meeting this week. "We revise down our policy rate forecast to 6.5 percent for 2018," a banking sector analyst said.

"Inflation is likely to be 4 percent to 4.5 percent in the current fiscal year." The consumer price index inflation clocked in at 3.68 percent in April as compared to 3.27 percent in the previous month.

However, a few analysts see a chance of interest rate hike in May’s monetary policy decision by the central bank. In the last monetary policy statement in March, the SBP’s policymakers kept the policy rate unchanged at 6 percent. Pakistan’s balance of payments continued to weaken.

The current account deficit surged 50 percent to $14 billion in 10 months of current fiscal year.