Securing refinancing: govt cleared dues of Chinese banks in advance, says Ishaq Dar

Finance Minister Ishaq Dar said on Saturday that Pakistan cleared the dues of Chinese banks few weeks in advance in a bid to secure refinancing.

In a press conference, he said that the “payments were due at the end of June”.

“Paying in advance is a charged exercise but Chinese banks waived off the penalty,” he said.

He notified that $1 billion was paid back to China Development Bank on Monday and it was rolled over on Friday.

“The bank agreed to refinance the loan facility to Pakistan and it did so within a week. We reached an understanding on Monday,” he said.

An additional $300 million have been paid back to the Bank of China on Friday and it is expected to be refinanced in 3-5 days.

The finance minister stated that an additional $1 billion have to be paid to China on state-to-state basis in two tranches of $500 million each.

“These will be renewed as well,” he said.

‘Govt was aware of Shell Petroleum’s decision to sell stake in Pakistan’

Dar added that Shell Pakistan Limited (SPL) is not shutting down, rather the parent Shell Petroleum Company Limited (SPCo) is selling its stake in the country.

He said that “Shell will continue operating in Pakistan after the sale is finalised and there won’t be large scale layoffs”.

Shell Pakistan’s share price has soared over 24% in 3 days after parent company’s intent to sell

A foreign investor is interested to purchase the stake of Shell and “it even wants the company to retain its name after sale”.

“The government knew about this for past many months as the firm had started process to offload its holding,” he said. “The company’s decision made headlines recently when a notification was sent to the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX).”

He added that Shell was selling its interest in many European nations as well hence “this is a policy matter”.

Oil industry and petroleum networks will remain unaffected from this transaction, the finance minister added.

Shell Pakistan Limited (SPL) on Wednesday announced that its parent company has notified its intent to sell its shareholding in SPL.

SPL, however, said that the development would have no impact on its current business operations, which will continue.