The total public debt stock of the federal government increased by 27.3 percent on a year-on-year (YoY) basis in June 2023 as compared to the same month of the last year.

According to the monthly data issued by the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP), the debt stock increased to Rs. 60.840 trillion in June 2023 as compared to Rs. 47.784 trillion in June 2022, an increase of Rs. 13.056 trillion.

Courtesy: Arif Habib Limited

The data shows that the domestic debt of the central government increased by 25 percent from Rs. 31.037 trillion to Rs. 38.809 trillion during the period.

Out of total domestic debt, the long-term public debt increased from Rs. 24.188 trillion to Rs. 29.331 trillion and the stock of short-term debt increased from Rs. 6.804 trillion to Rs. 9.335 trillion during the last year.

Out of the total long-term debt, the government raised Rs. 5.17 trillion through Federal Government Bonds including Pakistan investment bonds and GOP Ijara Sukuk and Bai-Muajjal of Sukuk during the last year. The total debt stock of Federal Government Bonds increased from Rs. 19.991 trillion to Rs. 25.161 trillion. The government raised Rs. 8 billion through issuing of Prize Bonds in one year.

The public debt remained at the same level of Rs. 475 billion in terms of SBP’s on-lending to GOP against SDRs allocation. The unfunded debt decreased to Rs. 2,926 billion from Rs. 3,336 billion. Foreign currency loans jumped to Rs. 384 billion from Rs. 9 billion during the period.

The report shows that the external debt of the central government increased to Rs. 22.031 trillion from Rs 16.747 trillion during the period, registering an increase of 31.6 percent.

Moreover, according to Arif Habib Limited, Pakistan’s total debt-to-GDP ratio settled at 71.9 percent as of June 2023 as compared to 71.8 percent in June 2022.

Source: Pro Pakistani