18 Feb 18

6
Sunday, February 18, 2018
Biz
Hefty taxes on petroleum products
disaster for economy says BMP
I
KARACHI: The
Businessmen Panel (BMP)
said on Saturday that Rs 40
per liter tax on diesel and Rs
34 on petrol is a disaster for
the economy as it would put
a heavy burden on the people
while Pakistan’s annual
inflation had climbed to 4.4
per cent in January from 3.7
pc in the same month last
year, mainly due to hike in
petroleum prices.
BMP Secretary-General
(Punjab), Mian Usman
Zulfiqar, said such heavy
taxes on petroleum products
was shocking which
showed how the finance
ministry was serious for the
welfare of the people.
"I think officials of
finance ministry don’t
know the cost impact on the
farmers and businessmen
who already faced the high
cost of business and inputs,
R A W A L P I N D I :
Director General, Akhter
Hameed Khan National
Center for Rural
Development (NCRD),
Fida Muhammad Wazir,
has said livestock sector
has great potential of
income resource and it can
be taped by adopting good
practices of Livestock
Management.
He stated this while
addressing the participants
of 5-Day training Course
about Livestock
Management for Income
and these figures will put
further disappointing them.
Generation in rural areas.
The participants of course
belonging to different
areas shared their experiences
and success stories.
Fida Muhammad Wazir
said that it is need of hour
that we should adopt modern
methods of Livestock
Farming to increase the
production. He said
increasing the production
of food stuff in different
sectors is dire need of
future and by conducting
capacity building training
programmes, we can
Usman said high oil
prices meant that
improve efficiency and
production.
He also mentioned the
role of NCRD for extending
training facilities to the
participants from all over
the country and abroad.
Director Training Israr
Muhammad Khan,
Research Officer
Muhammad Ahsan Jamil
and Deputy Director
Training II Ms. Soba
Saleemi in their presentations
highlighted various
issues regarding use of latest
methods of farming,
Pakistan’s export competitiveness
went down and
Livestock sector has great potential
of income resource says DG NCRD
RAWALPINDI: A vendor displaying strawberries to attract the customers at roadside.
Stock volatility: back with a
bang and here to stay
NEW YORK: U.S. stock markets are
unlikely to return to the unusually calm conditions
seen last year, even though equities
have already recovered more than half the
ground lost in the recent selloff and traders
have rapidly dialed down fear.
Stock market volatility spiked to a multiyear
high in the selloff and some products
that flourished in low volatility collapsed. A
higher-volatility environment means the 1
percent stock market swings of the past two
weeks will become commonplace, strategists
said.
It is something that investors will have to
get used to. The Cboe Volatility Index .VIX,
the most widely followed barometer of
expected near-term volatility for stocks, last
year logged a historically low average of 11.
“We expect the current shock to herald a
higher volatility regime,” said Jim Strugger,
CHINIOT: Farmers loading sugarcane on trolley in a field .
derivatives strategist at MKM Partners in
New York.
The VIX reached a 2-1/2-year high of
50.30 on Feb. 6. Since then it has slipped to
17.60, still well above the record low of 8.56
hit in November.
“Fear has come down dramatically but
certainly not to the level of complacency
seen pre-correction,” said Randy Frederick,
vice president of trading and derivatives for
Charles Schwab in Austin, Texas.
“VIX futures seem to indicate that the
VIX could trend down from current levels to
maybe as low as 15 over the next couple of
months, but there are few, if any, signs we’ll
see 10 again any time soon,” he said.
The VIX is derived from the price of
S&P 500 options and is an indicator of
investors’ collective estimate of near-term
gyrations for the benchmark stock index.
value addition, quality production,
effective marketing
and proper care of animals
to get benefits of livestock
and their by-products.
Dr. Mahida of
Livestock & Dairy
Development Department
Punjab, Rawalpindi along
with other doctors and
trainees presented the
model of Mobile Training
which has been specially
designed to train rural
population about care of
animals.
ADM, Syngenta
settle lawsuit
over biotech corn
exports to China
CHICAGO: U.S. grain
merchant Archer Daniels
Midland Co has settled a
lawsuit with Syngenta over
the seed company’s launch
of a biotech corn strain that
roiled grain exports to
China, according to regulatory
documents filed on
Friday.
ADM sued Syngenta
four years ago for selling
the corn variety known as
Agrisure Viptera or MIR
162 before it was approved
for import by China, an
importer on U.S. grain.
China rejected U.S. corn
cargoes that contained the
unauthorized strain, which
caused financial losses for
ADM, according to the
lawsuit.
China
approved imports of
Viptera corn in 2014.
ADM and Syngenta
reached a confidential settlement
over the matter in
December.
VIENNA: International
Monetary Fund chief
Christine Lagarde has no
objection to plans to turn
the euro zone’s bailout
fund into a European
Monetary Fund, she said
in comments published on
Saturday.
The European
Commission has suggested
transforming the role of
the government-controlled
European Stability
Mechanism (ESM) into a
full-blown European
Monetary Fund under parliamentary
control and
anchored in European
Union law, which would
also become a backstop
for the euro zone’s bank
resolution fund.
The plan is backed by
countries including France
and Germany.
“Why not?” Lagarde
said in an interview with
exports were already
falling. It also raises questions
about the decision to
depreciate the Pakistani
rupee. The logic of depreciation
was to make the
export sector more competitive
but in an importdependent
economy,
depreciation is likely to
increase domestic prices by
a similar amount. The
petrol price had to go up
simply because the value
of Pakistani currency has
gone down and petrol is an
imported good. The only
way to control its price is
to reduce the tax charged to
consumers.
BMP Secretary-General
further added that the country’s
energy import bill had
already risen heftily as the
global oil prices had spiked
by almost a third in the last
several months.
Trader sues Fidelity
over website glitch
during market rout
BOSTON: A New Jersey
trader filed a lawsuit against
Fidelity Investments, accusing
it of “gross negligence”
because he could not make
trades on the company’s website
earlier this month during
a volatile time on the stock
market.
The complaint by
Christopher Musso comes
after mutual fund company
Fidelity, which also operates
one of the largest U.S. online
brokerages, said on Feb. 6
that its website experienced
“intermittent technical difficulties”
as brokerage clients
watched a stock market rout
reverberate around the globe.
The lawsuit is seeking classaction
status.
Musso said he could not
execute trades using Fidelity’s
Active Trader Pro platform
when the market opened on
Feb. 6, according to his lawsuit,
filed in U.S. District
Court in Trenton, New Jersey.
“Considering the volatility
(a day earlier), it was
important for (Musso and
others) ... to have access to
Fidelity’s Active Trader Pro
platform in order to monitor
their respective investments
and be able to execute fast
and quick trades,” according
to the complaint.
President FPCCI leads delegation
to Iran for ECO-CCI Meetings
S L A M A B A D :
Ghazanfar Bilour, President
of the Federation of
Pakistan Chambers of
Commerce and Industry
(FPCCI) and ECO
Chamber of Commerce and
Industry (ECO-CCI) will
preside the forthcoming
statutory meeting of ECO-
CCI scheduled to be held on
March 5, 2018 at Tehran,
Iran.
The meetings will be
attended by the representatives
of Chambers of
Commerce and Industry of
Afghanistan, Azerbaijan,
Iran, Pakistan, Turkey,
Kazakhstan, Kyrgyz
Republic, Turkmenistan,
Tajikistan and Uzbekistan.
Prior to the statutory meetings,
there will be six
TORONTO: Commerce
Minister Pervaiz Malik has
invited Canadian companies
and investors to invest in
Pakistan where there is no
restriction on repatriation of
profits and dividends.
He was talking to representatives
of large multinational
companies of
Canadian origin at Chamber
of Commerce in Ontario on
Saturday.
The Minister apprised
them that Pakistan has overcome
socio-economic and
security related challenges
and laid down the foundation
of sustained economic
growth in the Country.
He said the government’s
prudent policies
have also restored macroeconomic
stability.
The Minister informed
that Pakistan’s investment
policy is one of the most liberal
in the region, provides
conducive environment for
Specialized Committees
Meetings on Trade facilitation,
Transportation,
Tourism, Arbitration,
Industry, Investment and
SMEs Promotion and
Women Entrepreneurs
Council on March 3 & 4,
2018.
At present, the total trade
of all ECO members countries
stood at US$ 638 billions
which has registered a
declining trend compared to
US$ 836 billions in 2012
and the reason behind the
declining of trade is global
recession and low oil prices
on which this natural
resources heavily depend.
The contribution of ECO
region in world trade is just
two percent despite the fact
that ECO has 6.2 percent of
attracting FDI.
He said that no foreign
firm has made losses in
Pakistan.
Pervez Malik said
besides the China-Pakistan
world population. Intraregional
trade accounts 8.4
percent of total trade of
world which is far below
the potentials available.
The Executive
Committee and General
Assembly will review
lower intra-regional trade
and investment, removal of
trade barriers, harmonization
in trade and investment
regulations, SMEs, arbitration
and gradual integration
of the member state’s
economies, development of
transport and communication,
effective infrastructure
linking in the region.
Pakistan will handover
Presidentship of ECO-CCI
for the year 2018-19 to
Afghanistan as per the
statute of ECO-CCI.
Commerce Minister invites Canadian
companies to invest in Pakistan
PESHAWAR: In
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government
is spending more
than fifteen billion rupees
on construction of various
hydro power projects.
A spokesman of
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa
TORONTO: Federal Minister for Commerce and Textile,
Mohammad Pervaiz Malik after a meeting with president
Ontario chamber of commerce, Rocco Rossi.
Energy Development
Organization told that two
hundred and fifty
hydropower projects have
been completed, while
work is underway on one
hundred and six hydro
power projects will be
Economic Corridor,
investors from USA, UK,
France, Germany, Japan,
Switzerland, South Korea
and the oil rich Gulf States
are investing in Pakistan.
KP govt spends Rs15bn on
construction of hydro power projects
completed within next two
months.
These projects are
being constructed in
Hazara and Malakand
divisions which after completion
will generate forty
megawatt electricity.
Cyberattacks are costly, things could get worse: US
Swiss newspaper Tages-
Anzeiger.
“The crisis the euro
zone went through showed
that it needs a crisis management
system that is
independent, able to act
quickly and that works
according to strict rules.
What that mechanism is
called is secondary. If one
wants to call it European
Monetary Fund, then
please.”
She also brushed aside
the suggestion that the
IMF’s role was being
usurped in a region where
it has been involved in
bailing out Portugal,
Ireland, Cyprus and
Greece in recent years –
often in exchange for
oversight and painful
reforms.
“We do not serve a
region but 189 countries.
That also includes euro
zone countries. And if
together they decide that
other crisis mechanisms
like the ESM are involved,
WASHINGTON: Cyberattacks
cost the United States between $57 billion
and $109 billion in 2016, a White
House report said Friday, warning of a
“spillover” effect for the broader economy
if the situation worsens.
ultimately A report by the White House
Council of Economic Advisers sought
to quantify what it called “malicious
cyber activity directed at private and
public entities” including denial of
service attacks, data breaches and
theft of intellectual property, and sensitive
financial and strategic information.
It warned of malicious activity by
“nation-states” and specifically cited
Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea.
The report noted particular concern
over attacks on so-called critical infrastructure,
such as highways, power
grids, communications systems, dams,
and food production facilities which
could lead to important spillover
impacts beyond the target victims.
“If a firm owns a critical infrastructure
asset, an attack against this firm
could cause major disruption throughout
the economy,” the report said.
It added that concerns were high
around cyberattacks against the financial
and energy sectors.
“These sectors are internally interconnected
and interdependent with
other sectors as well as robustly connected
to the internet, and are thus at a
highest risk for a devastating cyberattack
that would ripple through the
entire economy,” it said.
IMF chief says ‘Why not?’ to European Monetary Fund plan: report
VIENNA: Christine Lagarde, Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF),
attends a conference on "Transforming France’s Economy and Completing the Integration
of the Eurozone" with French Treasury and the IMF at the Bercy Ministry in Paris.
that is in order,” she was
quoted as saying.