Shares at the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) made significant gains on Friday and climbed more than 900 points in intraday trade. The KSE-100 index stood at 75,803.34, gaining 925.22, or 1.24 per cent, at 4:04pm from the previous close of 74,878.12. Raza Jafri, chief executive of EFG Hermes Pakistan, attributed the upward trajectory to Morgan Stanley Capital International’s (MSCI’s) semi-annual Index rebalancing taking place today with “further foreign buying” expected. “Investors also have an eye on a softer inflation reading, with the announcement expected on Monday. Both these factors are driving up the KSE-100 today,” he added. Mohammed Sohail, chief executive…
Author: Hasnain Abid Khanzada
LAHORE: The farming community is concerned about government plans to impose sales tax on agricultural inputs in the budget 2024-25. Farmers believe this measure would raise the cost of cultivation, which is already under inflationary pressure and would have far-reaching consequences for the struggling community. Aamer Hayat Bhandara, a farmer from Pakpattan district, said: “In an economy where farmers are already struggling to attain profitability, this tax burden poses a threat to the sector.” He warned that it would also fuel food inflation, a constant struggle for the common man. Taxing farm inputs may lead farmers to compromise on product…
MADRID: Madrid’s zoo on Thursday welcomed a giant panda couple to their new home as another phase of China’s breeding and reproduction programme for the bears begins in Spain. Former Queen Sofia, an advocate for pandas since the 1970s, hosted the official introduction of the three-year-old bears Jin Xi and Zhu Yu in Madrid. The pair were flown from Chengdu in southwestern China last month, but were officially introduced on Thursday after a quarantine period. China has loaned its treasured bears to overseas zoos over the years as goodwill ambassadors while also running conservation programmes back home that have seen…
SAN FRANCISCO: Social media giant Meta says its bid to thwart coordinated disinformation campaigns created through ever-improving generative AI is working, despite widespread concerns. Meta’s latest study on “coordinated inauthentic behaviour” on its platforms comes as fears mount that generative AI will be used to trick or confuse people in upcoming elections worldwide, notably in the United States. “What we’ve seen so far is that our industry’s existing defences, including our focus on behavior rather than content in countering adversarial threats, already apply and appear to be effective,” said David Agranovich, Meta’s threat disruption policy director, at a press briefing…
WASHINGTON: The James Webb Space Telescope has discovered what appears to be a new record-holder for the most distant known galaxy, a remarkably bright star system that existed just 290 million years after the Big Bang, Nasa said on Thursday. Since coming online in 2022, the Webb telescope has ushered in a new era of scientific breakthroughs, peering farther than ever before into the universe’s distant reaches — which also means it is looking back in time. And the latest finding has “profound implications” for our understanding of the so-called Cosmic Dawn, researchers said. An international team of astronomers first spotted the…
HAMAS said on Thursday it had told mediators it would not take part in more negotiations during ongoing aggression, but was ready for a “complete agreement”, including an exchange of prisoners if Israel stopped the war. Talks, mediated by among others Egypt and Qatar, to arrange a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas have repeatedly stalled, with both sides blaming the other for the lack of progress. The latest statement came as Israel pressed on with an offensive on the southern city of Rafah, in defiance of an International Court of Justice (ICJ) order to halt the attacks. “Hamas and the Palestinian…
RAFAH: Intense shelling and gunfire rocked Rafah on Thursday after Israel declared it had seized a strategic corridor along the Palestinian territory’s border with Egypt. Israel said its forces had taken over the 14-kilometre Philadelphi corridor, which it claims was used for weapons smuggling via tunnels. Egypt, a longtime mediator in the conflict, has rejected claims of smuggling tunnels running beneath the buffer zone. “Israel is using these allegations to justify continuing the operation on the Palestinian city of Rafah and prolonging the war for political purposes,” a high-level Egyptian source was quoted as saying by state-linked Al-Qahera News. Egyptian…
BEIJING: China wants to work with Arab nations to resolve hot spot issues in ways conducive to upholding fairness, justice and achieving long-term peace and stability, President Xi Jinping said in a speech on Thursday that also highlighted the Gaza crisis. China is seeking to strengthen its relations with Arab states as a model for maintaining world peace and stability, Xi was quoted as saying by state media at the China-Arab States Cooperation Forum in Beijing. In remarks about the war in Gaza, the Chinese leader said war cannot continue indefinitely, justice cannot be permanently absent and a “two-state solution”…
At least 15 people have died of suspected heatstroke in India’s eastern states of Bihar and Odisha on Thursday, authorities said, with the region gripped in a debilitating heatwave expected to continue until Saturday. India has been experiencing a blisteringly hot summer and a part of capital Delhi recorded the country’s highest ever temperature at 52.9 degrees Celsius this week, though that may be revised with the weather department checking the sensors of the weather station that registered the reading. While temperatures in northwestern and central India are expected to fall in the coming days, the prevailing heatwave over east India is…
The Slovenian government on Thursday approved a decision to recognise an independent Palestinian state, Prime Minister Robert Golob said, following in the steps of Spain, Ireland and Norway. “Today the government has decided to recognise Palestine as an independent and sovereign state,” he said at a news conference in Ljubljana. Parliament speaker Urska Klakocar Zupancic told a press conference in Ljubljana that Slovenian lawmakers are to vote on Tuesday on whether to recognise the Palestinian state. “The session is scheduled for Tuesday from 4pm (1400 GMT),” Zupancic said. The move is part of a wider effort by countries to coordinate pressure on…
