The Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) has registered a record number of 884 companies during the month of April 2017, witnessing an increase of 40 percent as compared to the same month of the preceding year.
According to the SECP, during the first ten months of the current fiscal year, 6,763 new companies have been registered at the SECP, which represented a growth of 34 percent. Similarly, 884 companies during the month of April have been registered, an increase of 40 percent if compared to the same month of the previous year. The massive increase in the number of newly registered companies resulted from various reforms’ measures introduced by the SECP, particularly the elimination of purchase of a third party’s digital signatures and the introduction of simple and hassle-free CNIC based user ID, PIN system for incorporation and post incorporation activities, said the sources at SECP.
It has also been noted that 77 percent of the companies have been registered through e-services (online mode); 60 percent have been incorporated through consultants while entrepreneurs got 40 percent of companies incorporated with the assistance of incorporation and facilitation wings of CROs.
Around 85 percent companies were registered as private limited companies, while around 13 percent companies were registered as single member companies. Two percent of the companies were registered as public unlisted, non-profit associations, trade organisations and foreign companies.
It is also learnt that the service sector took the lead with 136 companies, followed by trading with 128 companies. The construction sector came in third with 124 companies while other sectors’ share is; IT 89, tourism 57, education 35, food and beverages 24, engineering 22, real estate development 20, transport, fuel and energy 19 each, pharmaceutical and corporate agricultural farming 15 each, power generation and auto allied 12 each, cable, electric goods and communication with 11 each, while 135 companies belonged to other sectors. Moreover, 4 foreign companies were also registered by the CROs in Karachi and Lahore.
The SECP said that foreign investments have been reported in 57 new companies. These companies have foreign investors from, Australia, China, Germany, Italy, Japan, Jordan, South Korea, Kuwait, Netherlands, Norway, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, the UK and the US.
It is also pertinent to mention here that during the month of April, the highest number of companies, i.e. 310 companies were registered at the Company Registration Office (CRO), Islamabad, followed by 258 and 176 companies registered at CROs in Lahore and Karachi respectively. The CROs in Peshawar, Multan, Faisalabad, Quetta, Sukkur and Gilgit-Baltistan registered 50, 41, 18, 12, 6 and 13 companies respectively.
