A senior team of FBR led by Mr. Asrar Raouf, Honorable Member Tax Policy, Federal Board of Revenue, met with representatives of the Karachi Stock Exchange to address issues related to capital gains tax. A consensus was reached on achieving tax payer facilitation to ensure widening of the tax net. Confidence building measures to achieve this include: 1. The committee considered various proposals to avoid hard-ship to tax-payers. A sub-committee comprising members from FBR, and The Karachi Stock Exchange was constituted to consider the same. 2. FBR will establish a separate cell for facilitation of foreign investors at LTU and RTO. This information will be provided to the Stock Exchange. 3. Financing income/markup under securities lending and borrowing regulations, margin financing and any other leverage products as approved by SECP, would be taxed at the rate of 10%, as full and final tax. 4. Gain or loss under day trading and trading in derivative products would be subject to CGT und...

ISLAMABAD: Adnan Afridi, Managing Director, Karachi Stock Exchange, has been elected as Chairman of the Executive Committee of South Asian Federation of Exchanges (SAFE). His election has taken place during the 8th Annual General Assembly meeting of the SAFE held in Abu Dhabi on March 11, 2009. Mr. Afridi’s election to the office of the Chairman of the Federation was proposed by Mr. Mahesh L. Soneji, ex-Chairman SAFE and MD/CEO Bombay Stock Exchange. He was unanimously elected by the votes of all the regional exchanges of various members comprising of the regional depositories and clearing companies whose representatives were present during the aforesaid General Assembly meeting. Afridi was congratulated by all the representative of the member entities. The Members expected that the SAFE would progress further under the dynamic leadership of Afridi.

Bloomberg Report Pakistan’s biggest exchange may triple the current 5 percent limit that a stock can decline each day and introduce so-called circuit breakers that limit how much the entire market can fall, Adnan Afridi, managing director, said in an interview in Karachi. “Our circuit breakers are a bit narrow by international standards,” Afridi said late yesterday. “We are looking at a combination of having wider circuit breakers, maybe 10 or 15 percent, and then having market halts, of say, 3 to 5 percent.” Pakistan is seeking to boost investment in shares after its benchmark index declined 58 percent in 2008, the most in 18 years, because of political instability and an economic slowdown. Freeing up trading limits would attract more investors, said Tariq Iqbal Khan, chairman of Pakistan’s biggest money manager. “If a stock has to fall 15 percent, it will either fall in one day or three days, the stocks have to come down to natural price,” said Khan, who manages the equivalent of $94...