Comment by Riaz Haq on January 15, 2013 at 10:21pm

Here's a Nation report on oil and gas production in Pakistan:

Country’s average oil production has increased by a decent 10 per cent to 71.6k barrels a day in 2012 from 64.9k in 2011 while gas production, which contributes approximately 50 per cent to energy mix, grew by 4 per cent to an average of 4.2bcfd from 2011 average gas production of 4.1bcfd, latest data revealed.

Industry experts said that five years back in 2007 average gas production was 3.9bcfd. “This increase is well below the organic growth in its consumption thereby creating huge deficit affecting the overall economic growth,” said Nauman Khan, an energy expert. He said that major news of the year was commissioning of KPD-TAY that added an average 104mmcfd to the system. However, other gas fields like Qadirpur, Zamazama, Mari led their due hands. However, natural decline in major fields namely Sui and Sawan coupled with reduce production from Tal block diluted its impact.

According to experts, oil production was 70.4k in 2007. Improvement in 2012 was largely attributed to Nashpa field. During 2012, Nashpa field of Naspha block located in KPK region of the Pakistan was the star performer for the sector. Thanks to favorable results of its appraisal wells, fields production increased by a mammoth 109 per cent to above 11k bpd as against 5.5k bpd last year. Other notable increase also came from Adhi fields as its production rose by a decent 16 per cent. The much talked abou, Tal block production increased by a mere 3 per cent, despite commissioning of Makori East towards the end of the year. Though, experts continue to have conviction in the block’s potential but commissioning of Makori CPF (Central Processing Facility) holds its key.

A Top line security report suggests that near-term trigger is expected to come from materialization production from Sinjhoro fields, Mamikhel-2 and Maramzai-2, while improved production from Naspha, Adhi and Mela fields are also events to keep a track.

Amongst the listed companies, OGDC’s average gas production increased by a decent 14 per cent in 2012, largely attributed to KPD-TAY effect, while its oil production grew by 7 per cent. PPL performed well in the oil, depicting a growth of 12 per cent however, its gas production declined by 4 per cent due to subdued performance of Sui and Sawan. 2012 was a disappointing year for POL whose oil production declined by 18 per cent mainly on account capped production from Tal and decline in production from its own operating fields. Analysts are of the view that with security concerns and circular debt restricting Pakistan oil & gas exploration companies to tap in new reservoir, the sector continues to rely on maximizing the yield of existing reservoirs, industry experts said.

As a result, the increase in oil and gas production in 2012 failed to fill the mounting demand thereby affecting the overall industrial growth besides affecting the transport and other segments

http://www.nation.com.pk/pakistan-news-newspaper-daily-english-onli...

Comment by Riaz Haq on January 17, 2013 at 8:50am

Here's an ET blog post taking media to task:

A recent article in Wired, Danger Room highlighted the resurgence of the US drone campaign in Pakistan. While it focuses on the war, a lot was left untold about the nation’s story that is as heartening as it is heartrending, and as inspiring as it is seemingly dismaying.
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The story of four of these start-ups, that launched in 2012 speak volumes about the resilience, commitment and resourcefulness of its founders.

The first is Vital Agri Nutrients, a young, agricultural Research and Development focused company that is working on developing innovative products for farmers. It has had some recent breakthroughs with their micro-nutrients and soil amendments which are currently in field trials. Given the expected shortage of water and growing prices of fertilisers world-wide, the company and its products present a promising opportunity for small and large farmers to improve the crop yield and lower their input cost per acre by employing soil amendments that help with more efficient use of fertilisers and water in plants.

Next, four young entrepreneurs at Eyedeus, aided by decades of joint research in computer vision, have developed technology that enables mobile devices to have eyes and intelligently process real-world imagery using an increasingly powerful mobile processors. Unlike the cameras on mobile devices that just allow ‘dumb’ recording of images or videos, Eyedeus technology allows developers to augment the reality around users. The company’s first product, called ‘Groopic’ (beta available on the AppStore) is already getting rave reviews. Groopic allows group pictures to be taken in a way never before possible. The person taking the picture can now be part of the group picture, go figure!

Eyedeus, by the way, is part of a full-service technology incubator called Plan 9, that’s a visionary initiative of the government of Punjab, and it hosts at least a dozen other start-ups alongside Eyedeus, working on equally innovative products and services.

Similarly, Invest2Innovate is another accelerator that is supporting at least five entrepreneurial ventures focused on businesses with a large social impact.

Third is a new age production house called JugnooMedia, developing interactive, digital musical toys for mobile devices with an aim of providing toddlers and young children new avenues of learning that are more fun and effective than the traditional, classroom teaching. The demos of their first title are very impressive and the company has announced that it will be released on the Apple AppStore and Android Marketplace soon.

And finally, there is BLISS – a social venture that is aimed at improving the livelihood of women in Pakistan alongside educating them. BLISS has already done a pilot program in a small village of Pakistan where women were taught embroidery skills alongside formal school education in the first phase. In the second phase, BLISS provided the same women an opportunity to co-op with the company and develop handbags designed by professional designers which were then marketed by BLISS through its online store as well as an impressive list of global brand ambassadors. The women who made the bags got the lion’s share of the revenue from those sales and the rest of the money is being used to sustain the operations of the organisation and scale the program.
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The next time a story is told about the problems Pakistan is having with the political instability, corruption, energy shortage and terrorism the world must know, that to the same land belong some of the best, battle-tested and inventive entrepreneurs working on shaping the future of the world!

http://blogs.tribune.com.pk/story/15611/pakistan-more-than-just-dro...

Comment by Riaz Haq on January 19, 2013 at 9:33pm

Here's an ET report on Pakistan's exclusion from Morgan Stanley's Emerging Market Index:

The MSCI Emerging Markets Index is a free float-adjusted market capitalisation index, which measures equity market performance of emerging markets that include Brazil, Chile, China, Colombia, Czech Republic, Egypt, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Korea, Malaysia, Mexico, Morocco, Peru, Philippines, Poland, Russia, South Africa, Taiwan, Thailand, and Turkey. With 821 constituents, the index covers approximately 85% of the free float-adjusted market capitalisation in each country.

Pakistan was part of the Emerging Markets Index for 15 years, but MSCI dropped the country in December 2008. According to Askari, MSCI did not remove Pakistan because of any quantitative changes: rather, this was done solely because of the imposition of the floor rule by KSE authorities that year, which shut the stock market for over three months in August 2008.

“We should keep in mind that the Czech Republic and Peru have three companies each, while Hungary and Morocco have four companies each which meet the requirements of the MSCI Emerging Markets Index,” Askari said, emphasising the fact that in terms of the number of eligible companies, Pakistan is ahead of these four countries.

“They have not given us any logical reason yet. They keep saying we’re reviewing your case, but there hasn’t been any definite answer. Their reluctance is a mystery to me,” Askari added.

The MSCI communications team did not respond to repeated queries from The Express Tribune.

According to the MSCI Global Investable Market Indices Methodology issued in March 2011, a country must have at least three companies with full market capitalisation of $876 million, float market capitalisation of $438 million and 15% Annualised Traded Value Ratio – a liquidity measure – to become part of the MSCI Emerging Markets Index. Five Pakistani companies currently fulfil these requirements.

As for MSCI’s market accessibility criteria, capital market regulations in Pakistan do not discriminate between local and foreign investors, as the latter have no special registration and/or licencing requirement. Similarly, foreign investors may acquire up to 100% shares in a listed company through the secondary market.

As for the ease of capital inflows/outflows, which is another criterion for a country’s inclusion into the MSCI Emerging Markets Index, the regulatory framework in Pakistan allows foreign investors to trade freely in equities and debt instruments, he said. There are no restrictions on foreign investors taking their capital out of the country, he pointed out.

“The Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan has implemented necessary measures to ensure that market discipline and integrity are not compromised in the future by ad hoc decision-making, such as floor rules, by the country’s stock exchanges,” Askari added.

While mentioning that the returns on the KSE-100 index were 49.3% in rupee terms and 37% in dollar terms in 2012, Askari said MSCI must review its decision to keep Pakistan out of its Emerging Markets Index.

http://tribune.com.pk/story/495921/why-should-we-be-left-out-of-the...

Comment by Riaz Haq on January 19, 2013 at 10:03pm

Here's PakistanToday on vehicle sales data in Pakistan:

ISLAMABAD - Tractors and trucks production during last five months of current financial year registered growth of 83.50 percent and 15.47 percent respectively.
About 21,550 tractors were produced during first five months of current financial year as compared to 11,744 tractors during same period last year.
According to the data of Pakistan Bureau of Statistics about 732 trucks were produced in first five months of current financial year as compared to the 866 trucks production of same period last year.
Meanwhile, 257 buses and 45376 jeeps produced during the period from July- November 2012-13 as compared to the same period of last year.
The data revealed that 6165 numbers of light commercial vehicles were produced in first five months of current financial year as compared to the same period of last year.
About 688492 numbers of motorcycles were produced during the period under review as compared to the 691818 numbers production of same period last year.
During the month of November 2012, about 4777 numbers of tractors
Were produced as compared to 4017 numbers of tractors production in November 2011 where as 108 numbers trucks were produced as compared to 134 numbers production same month of last year.
About 35 buses produced in month of November 2012 as compared to the production of 48 buses of same month of last year.
Jeeps and car production was recorded at 8009 during the months of November 2012 as compared to the 10030 cars and jeeps produced in November 2011.
Motorcycles production during the month of November 2012 was recorded at 142497 as against the production of 137825 motor cycles produced in the month of November 2011.

http://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2013/01/16/news/profit/pakistan-pos...

Comment by Riaz Haq on January 20, 2013 at 9:12am

Here's BR on renewable energy projects in Sindh:

KARACHI: Sindh government is working on 40 different power projects in its wind corridor, with a total generation capacity of 2000 MW in next two years, said Mir Hussain Ali, provincial Secretary for Environment and Alternate Energy Department.



This will also allow the electrification of about 120 schools in rural Sindh, he said addressing a session on the Renewable Energy organized by IUCN - Pakistan on Sunday.



Talking about the opportunities in the wind corridor, he said, that the government is working on about 40 projects with various investors with total generation capacity of 2000 MW in the next two years.



"This is despite the fact that Renewable Energy projects often do not get a green light in public sector because of the initial costs," he said.



The Sindh secretary for environment and alternative energy said the government is also supplying solar stoves and working on a biogas project worth Rs. 200 million rupees.



The secretary for environment and alternative energy mentioned that in Mirpurkhas, Solar Water Pumping Stations have been installed to meet the electricity crunch.



Mir Hussain Ali also talked about having immense potential of biogas at the Cattle Colony in Karachi and prospects in coastal areas of Pakistan in lieu of wind related projects.



On the occasion Carl Pope, a renowned expert on renewable energy in his presentation,"Renewable Energy Cheaper in the Long Run," said that presently over 1.3 billion people in the world are estimated to be living without electricity.



One billion of these people, including 700 million residents of South Asia will remain without electricity until 2030 if the switch to alternatives does not happen, he warned.

http://www.brecorder.com/top-news/108-pakistan-top-news/102132-sind...

Comment by Riaz Haq on January 21, 2013 at 9:24am

Here's an APP report about Pakistan's top ranking in snooker:

Asif's title victory helped Pakistan to get 120 points and accumulated total 172 points to attain top position in the Men Snooker Ranking for the year 2012. Pakistan had 52 points after previous year's championship and was at No.8.

The ranking is based on points accumulated for their performance in current year and immediate previous championships,said a spokesman of Pakistan Billiard and Snooker Federation here on Monday.

Both the players from England reached in Quarter finals and one moved to final helped the country to gain 100 points and placed England at position 3 with total 142 points. Last year England was at Position 10. Poland and Switzerland also performed well to better their positions as 16 and 17 from previous bests of 28 and 32 respectively. Countries that have dropped down noticeably in the ranking list includes Thailand (down to Rank 4 from top position), India (from 2 to 6), Ireland (from 3 to 8) and Afghanistan (from 9 to 23).

http://www.brecorder.com/sports/other-sports/102371-pakistan-attain...

Comment by Riaz Haq on January 22, 2013 at 9:48am

Here's Bloomberg on KSE-100 rebounding on earnings expectations:

Pakistan’s (KSE100) stocks rose to a three- week high, led by Fauji Fertilizer Co., the biggest maker of the farming material, which reports earnings tomorrow.

The Karachi Stock Exchange 100 Index gained 1.5 percent to 16,894.09, the highest close since Dec. 31. Fauji Fertilizer rose 1.5 percent to 120.36 rupees, the biggest contributor to the benchmark index’s advance. Lucky Cement Ltd. (LUCK), due to report profit on Jan. 28, rose 1.6 percent to 153.46 rupees.

“Investors are confident that the earning season will be pretty good this quarter,” Khurram Schehzad, head of research at Arif Habib Ltd., said by phone.

Arif Habib, a Karachi-based brokerage, forecasts overall earnings to rise as much as 15 percent in the three months to Dec. 31 from a year earlier, he said. The KSE 100 trades for 6.9 times estimates for this year’s profit, the lowest among 15 Asia-Pacific benchmark indexes tracked by Bloomberg.

The KSE 100 tumbled 3.2 percent on Jan. 15, the biggest drop since August 2011, after the nation’s Supreme Court ordered the arrest of Prime Minister Raja Pervez Ashraf. The gauge has climbed 4.9 percent since then, after the chairman of the anti- corruption agency told the chief justice Jan. 17 there isn’t enough evidence to arrest the prime minister and others accused of graft in awarding power contracts.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-01-22/pakistan-s-stocks-rise-to-...

Comment by Riaz Haq on January 22, 2013 at 10:01pm

Here's a Nation report on GoP MOU with Twariqi and Posco:

In order to promote and closely collaborate on the development of steel and infrastructure industry in Pakistan, the joint venture of Al-Ittefaq Steel Products Company and POSCO, have signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the government of Pakistan through the Ministry of Investment for the backward and forward integration of Tuwairqi Steel Mills Limited (TSML).

Forward integration would be a further value addition through a Melt Shop, producing world standard steel grades, while backward integration would be to the extent of exploring iron ore locally in Baluchistan, its beneficiation & pelletization as well. The estimated investment on these projects would be around US$900 million.

The MoU was signed by S. Anjum Bashir, Secretary, Ministry of Investment, Prime Minister Secretariat, Government of Pakistan and Zaigham Adil Rizvi, Director (Projects), TSML in the presence of Dr. Hilal Hussain Al-Tuwairqi, Chairman Al-Tuwairqi Holding and Joon Yang Chung, Chairman & CEO, POSCO of South Korea.

As per the MoU, GoP will facilitate TSML in using Pachinkoh Deposit (Nokkundi) and Dilband Deposit (Mastung) for the development of iron ore mine and utilization of such developed iron ore products as raw material for TSML’s DRI Plant and Pellet Plant in its 1st and 3rd phase respectively. GoP has also committed to facilitate TSML with 180 MW of electricity, 3,000 m3 of water per day and natural gas as per the additional quantity required for TSML’s upcoming projects.

Through the MoU, POSCO has also expressed its interest for exploring business opportunities with GoP in engineering, procurement and construction services in the fields of infrastructure and industrial, environmental, electric power and oil & gas facilities.

On this occasion, Dr. Hilal Hussain Al-Tuwairqi, Chairman Al-Tuwairqi Holding said that Al-Tuwairqi’s vision is to participate in the development of national economy, in order to have a long sustaining growth of Pakistan. “We are looking forward to create, for our younger generations, ample job opportunities to build a strong and prosperous nation, on the face of this plant. Al-Tuwairqi sees Pakistan as a land of opportunities and we are very clear in our perception that Pakistan as a country has to grow and we are determined to play an instrumental role in its development,” he remarked.

Mr. Joon Yang Chung, Chairman & CEO, POSCO said that POSCO is serving some of the most quality conscious markets in the world, and with its vision and expertise in the global steel industry spanning over 4 decades, POSCO is committed to transform TSML into a globally renowned company for quality steel making.

http://www.nation.com.pk/pakistan-news-newspaper-daily-english-onli...

Comment by Riaz Haq on January 25, 2013 at 10:59am

Pak textile exports rose 8.55% in July-Dec 2012 period, reports Fiber2Fashion:

With a year-on-year rise of 8.55 percent, Pakistan’s textile and garment exports for first half of the current fiscal increased to US$ 6.458 billion from US$ 5.590 billion worth of exports made during the corresponding period of last year.

According to Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS), exports for December 2012 grew to US$ 1.058 billion, compared to exports of US$ 1.009 billion in December 2011.

Product-wise, cotton yarn exports grew by 38 percent year-on-year during July-December 2012, while that of cotton cloth by 12.31 percent, yarn by 53.94 percent, towels by 10.98 percent, tents by 25.39 percent, readymade garments by 13.29 percent and other textile materials by 62.95 percent.

On the other hand, raw material exports plummeted by 51.46 percent year-on-year, cotton carded by 85.15 percent, knitwear by 2.02 percent, bed wear by 9.61 percent, art silk and synthetic textiles by 19.69 percent and made-up articles by 6.89 percent, the PBS data showed.

http://www.fibre2fashion.com/news/textile-news/newsdetails.aspx?new...

Comment by Riaz Haq on January 25, 2013 at 11:03am

Karachi Bourse closes over 17,000 points first time ever, reports Dawn:

KARACHI: Stocks roared ahead at the Karachi Stock Exchange with the KSE-100 index quite easily breaking the psychological barrier of 17,000 on Thursday.

The benchmark settled at 17,056.36 points, representing gain of 147.69 points.

The market capitalisation-based KSE-30 index jumped 125.28 points to 13,931.66 points.

Figures released by the National Clearing Company of Pakistan showed that mutual funds were major buyers with net purchases worth $6.03 million. Foreign investors sold equity in the net sum of $0.76 million.

Turnover galloped to 271 million shares on Thursday, against 218 million shares traded the earlier day with the trading value increasing to Rs6.9 billion, from Rs5.5 billion.

Market capitalisation was up to Rs4.263 trillion, from Rs4.223 trillion.

In all, 353 stocks came up for trading with 205 gainers; 123 losers and 25 ending at the previous values.

Equity dealer, Samar Iqbal at Topline Securities observed that the Karachi bourse managed to close above psychological mark of 17,000.

Institutional buying and good corporate results helped equity prices to improve by approximately one per cent.

More than expected earnings announcement by Engro Foods helped the market sentiment.

Mid cap cement stocks performed well as investors expecting healthy profits for the quarter ending December.

Ahsan Mehanti at Arif Habib Corp stated that the stocks had closed at record high amid rising trades in the earnings announcements session at KSE after SBP slashed yield on T-bills.

Other reasons listed for the bullish trend at the market were investor hopes for policy rate cut in monetary announcement due next month, rising local cement prices, easing political uncertainty and renewed foreign interest in Pakistani equities.

Hasnain Asghar Ali at Escorts Capital commented that fresh inflows in E&P stocks took along the benchmark for yet another historic session.

The heavy weight E&P stocks led the bullish run and were well supported by the cement and textiles. Also better than expected earnings of EFood invited renewed buying interest as the company reported record growth in earnings.

The news flows regarding Secondary Public Offering of PPL, settlement of property dispute with Etisalaat and issuance of 3G license stayed the driving factor for the local equities.

Judicial hearings, law and order concerns and volatility on political front continued to suggest caution.

On Thursday’s trading, Unilever Food posted the highest gain for the day, in the sum of Rs105 to Rs3905 and was followed by Bata (Pak) which rose by Rs41.05 to Rs1355.

On the other side, UniLever Pak posted the heaviest loss of Rs35.16 to Rs9914.83 and Sanofi-Aventis Pak declined by Rs9 to Rs316.

The 10-top active list was again dominated by the sideboard items. Fauji Cement rose by 32 paisa to Rs7.80 on a huge volume of 60m shares.

It was followed by Maple Leaf Cement, which hit the ‘upper circuit’ with a gain of Re1 to end at Rs17.86 on 23m shares.

Byco Petroleum added 45 paisa to close at Rs14.37 on 20m shares; Jah.Sidd.Co was up by19 paisa to s16.53 on 14m shares; Fatima Fertilizer Company edged higher by 8 paisa to Rs25.88 on13m shares; PTCL was up by 46 paisa to Rs17.82 on12m shares; Lafarge Pakistan was firm by 16 paisa to Rs5.46 on 8m shares; Engro Foods, which declared financial figures on Thursday, was greeted warmly by investors with the price of stock jumping by Rs3.83 to Rs100.82.

TRG was the only scrip among the volume leaders which shed 7 paisa to s7.01 on 6m shares and KESC added 19 paisa to its overnight value and closed at Rs5.84 on 6m shares.

http://dawn.com/2013/01/25/kse-index-breaks-17000-barrier/

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