News-Prime Bank Stock Price Indexes
Ups and downs continue
Karachi stock market remained highly volatile during January 2003. Towards the mid of the month, market witnessed all time high stock values before the highly overbought market plunged drastically. Exuberant carry-over charges, which soared as high as 48 per cent at one time, also contributed to panic selling on almost all counters.

Bank of England
Bank of England: testimony to
parliament committee
Following are highlights of testimony to parliament's Treasury Select Committee by Bank of England Governor Sir Edward George, governor-designate Mervyn King and other Monetary Policy Committee members on the MPC's latest inflation report: King says: "There are many risks to the central projection on either side". "With a slower recovery in the world economy than we had thought and with a slower recovery in business investment, we have lower growth in our recent projection than in November."

IN FOCUS
Development of poultry industry
By M.M. Nazri
Poultry types include principally chicken, turkey, ducks and geese. Poultry is raised for meat and eggs. The poultry industry has made great strides in the last few decades in Pakistan and has increased at the rate of 20 to 25 per cent per annum. At present there are about more than 10,000 poultry farms in the country.

ECONOMIC HORIZON
Pakistan Perspective
Some uncertainty prevails
The recent bomb explosion at the Pakistan State Oil (PSO) parking with some of the similar incidents at many sensitive areas in Karachi shows that there are elements bent upon destroying investor confidence in the city, and as Karachi is the major industrial city, the reflection would be carried throughout Pakistan. Under the circumstances, foreign investors would shy away and local investors would adopt the attitude of wait and see.

India poised to deliver expansionary budget
Indian Finance Minister Jaswant Singh is expected to try to please voters on Friday with a mildly expansionary budget ahead of state and national polls while seeking to avoid damage to India's poor international financial standing.

RATING ROUNDUP
Publicly Notified Ratings by JCR-VIS Credit Rating Company LIMITED
Adamjee Insurance Company Ltd.

SPOTLIGHT
NPO's role in shaping govt policies
This article is part of a comprehensive paper on Non-profit Organizations, being reproduced here in sections identifying various elements. Last month, we discussed 'government policy and future issues and now we move on to 'role in shaping government policies and examine the impact of non-profit organizations on the way policies are introduced, shaped and implemented. 

The dirty laundry banks won't air
Millions of dollars of nonperforing loans weigh down bank balance sheets across Asia. But by using a variety of standard accounting practices, some banks have been able to hide much of this red ink - Putting at risk the future of the banks and investors alike

STOCK MARKET CONFIDENCE
NEWS - CresBank STOCK EXCHANGE CONFIDENCE BAROMETER
Standing at low
During December 2001, level of investors' confidence in the stock market remained low as compared to that prevailed during the preceding month. The News-CresBank Confidence Barometer for December was measured at 38 per cent on an aggregate basis. Despite dropping down from 47 per cent of November, the barometer managed to maintain the same category of 'very low to low'. A week-to-week analysis reveals that the barometer managed to go as high as 44 per cent, in the middle of the month. and dipped as low as 33 per cent toward the month-end, hardly float above the 'very low' category.

The Stock Market Confidence Barometer developed by Vital Information Services Pvt. Ltd. is a unique instrument that expresses in percentage the level of investors' confidence prevailing at the Karachi Stock Exchange taking into account each and every share transaction. The model electronically tracks the number of shares traded (adjusted for free float) at the KSE along with their respective prices, to find out the exact movement of investors' money. The investors place their funds world wide in other than safe-haven stocks when they are confident of the prevailing economic and political situation. On the other hand, when they are not so confident of the economic and political developments, they transfer their funds from those comparatively risky items to the safe-havens. This phenomenon is the foundation stone of this Confidence Barometer.
-- M. Bilal Aftab

REFLECTION