Demystifying Pakistan’s high electricity prices
Despite increasing installed capacity and diversifying the generation mix prices are rising… and here’s why
Ultimate Finance Champion
Now that Ishaq Dar’s name has been floated and retracted by the news media of the country, it is safe to say that Interim...
Think about energy security
Energy price volatility has shocked and awed the world, unleashing a wave of inflation and pain on hundreds of millions of citizens. While much...
Let’s take a hard look at Net Metering
The Government of Pakistan had to face tremendous backlash lately regarding imposing a fixed tax on solar panels. On its part, the Government’s intention...
Unlocking foundational revenue
I often explain the idea of a three tiered federation as a three storied structure. Just as a structure would not be stable without...
The problem of revenue is bad tax policy, not cheating
Revenue generation is important but not top priority as in last 3 decades. Much effort and money has been spent in collecting taxes and...
The smog will worsen. It doesn’t have to
We are not condemned to live in this hell forever. Measures can and must be taken
A primer on refinery margins
To a casual observer, refining is a boring and largely commoditized business often exposed to volatility in commodity prices. During the last few months,...
How depositors lose out on Islamic savings accounts
The increase in interest rates to almost all-time high levels, coupled with a super tax on bank profits, as well as an arbitrary tax...
Fixing pay and pensions
250 million people exist to pay the salaries of government employees
The case against sovereign default
Groundhog Day is now a preferred reference point for the economic cycle in Pakistan, with each crisis largely resembling the previous crisis, and a...
Trouble at the power plants
In the last few weeks, there have been a slew of reports about plant failures and power assets going offline one after the other...
Bond spreads rise with political risk
Pakistan has a long history in global capital markets. The country’s first international bond dates to late 1994 when $150mn was raised at a...
The need for farmer cooperatives in Pakistan
As the economy goes through a structural transformation, farmer cooperatives are more important than ever before
On what women wear to work, and why it should be simpler
Traversing what is and what is not appropriate for work is very different for women than it is for men
