Boycotts and border closures: How a stock market star lost its mojo
Pakistan Aluminium Beverage Cans has no competitors, but BDS boycotts and closures on the Afghanistan border have left the company adrift
Why Syed Babar Ali should not buy Akzo Nobel
The Packages Group is reportedly interested in buying AkzoNobel. For one of Pakistan’s cleanest and most professional conglomerates, entering the paint business might mean getting their hands dirty
Bringing biotech to Pakistan
Ferozsons, and now its subsidiary BF Biosciences, are betting that the Pakistani market is ready for cutting edge life sciences products. Are they right?
Barkat Frisian Agro’s bet on the industrialization of food
The company’s ability to reap profits has been predicated on the notion that Pakistanis will eat more processed food, as incomes rise and more women enter the workforce
No, Gul Ahmed is not shutting down exports
A combination of lazy and innumerate financial journalism and the Pakistani penchant for pessimism resulted in people thinking this is a way more significant news story than it actually is
Why P&G is leaving Pakistan
The company’s presence in the country is an example of a global multinational creating a hard-fought market for itself from scratch. Its departure will leave a gaping hole
The fall of Al Shaheer
The company that practically invented Pakistan’s meat export industry is on life support as its new investors Sunridge work to bring the defunct meat manufacturer back to life
Could the Saudi-Pak Defence Pact force Modi and Islamabad to play nice?
India’s economy relies heavily on the Gulf for remittances, trade, and oil. As the US pressures Modi to abandon Russian crude, Pakistan’s new relationship with Saudi Arabia could force the Indians to rethink their strategy on Pakistan
The ‘stable’ Gulf is gone. What comes next?
Pax Americana is well and truly dead as far as the Middle East is concerned, which means that the Gulf’s much-vaunted stability is gone. What does that mean for Pakistan’s economy?
Still thinking about shopping like a billionaire? Maybe not at these prices
Temu seems to have ended its deep discounting policy globally. What could be behind this decision? And why has the Competition Commission of Pakistan recommended that the PTA block the platform?
The crimes of Punjab’s real estate barons are drowning us
Climate change and river infrastructure has rapidly changed what modern water management looks like. Real estate developers and their political allies are criminally complicit
Karachi isn’t resilient. It’s suffocating under the PPP
The country’s financial capital is a uniquely dysfunctional city. Its real estate tells the story of how its citizens cope with the incompetence of their ruling class
The “Too Big For Pakistan” Problem
Four of Pakistan's largest conglomerates find themselves in the awkward position of having too much cash, and not enough places to deploy it in the domestic economy. Outbound FDI should be made easier
The slow decay of Pakistani Agriculture
Pakistani farmers are using more land and growing crops more aggressively. The only outcomes have been shrinking yields, smaller farms, and slimmer margins
The pipe dream of energy independence
How far off is Pakistan from having purely domestic sources of energy, and how would that impact the country?