The Pakistan Hosiery Manufacturers and Exporters Association (PHMA) has criticised the decision of the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) to maintain its key policy rate at 11%, calling it a major blow to industrial recovery, export growth and job creation efforts.
In a statement on Thursday, PHMA Zonal Chairman Abdul Hameed said that value-added textile export sectors were expecting a long-awaited reduction in interest rate to single digits in light of falling inflation and improved economic indicators, but the SBP’s decision deeply disappointed the industry, which was already reeling from high production costs and declining global competitiveness.
Abdul Hameed pointed out that continuation of such a high policy rate had no justification when headline inflation had dropped to around 4% and core inflation was showing clear signs of moderation. “Based on the current inflation rate, the policy rate should not be more than 6% and keeping at nearly double that level is stifling industrial potential.”
He said that the central bank’s refusal to bring down interest rate despite macroeconomic stability and declining price pressures was blocking the path to growth as borrowing costs were simply unaffordable for small and medium-sized exporters.
High interest rates are choking liquidity, preventing capital investment, discouraging new orders and making Pakistani products more expensive in international markets.
Citing an example, Abdul Hameed said that neighbouring countries had already adopted a more pro-growth monetary stance as policy rates in India, Bangladesh, China and Thailand stood well below that in Pakistan.
The Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) ended on a strong note on Thursday, fuelled by investor enthusiasm following news of an energy agreement between Pakistan and the US. The benchmark KSE-100 index moved higher by 978.17 points, or 0.71%, and settled at 139,390.42.
Market participants welcomed the breakthrough, which included reduced trade barriers for Pakistan and a strategic partnership aimed at unlocking the country’s untapped oil potential. It sparked a wave of buying in key sectors, led by exploration and production (E&P) stocks.
JS Global analyst Muhammad Hasan Ather commented that Thursday’s rally was driven by the successful trade agreement between Pakistan and the United States, which boosted investor sentiment. “The deal promises rationalisation of tariffs on exports and increased US investment in sectors like energy, IT and infrastructure,” he said.
Topline Securities, in its review, wrote that bulls stampeded through July, driving the KSE-100 index up by 11% month-on-month (MoM) to a record-shattering close at 139,390 points.
Market euphoria was fuelled by the federal cabinet’s green light to the largest-ever financial restructuring plan, aimed at retiring Rs1.275 trillion worth of circular debt over six years, coupled with the State Bank’s steady hand on policy rate, keeping investor confidence intact, it said.
Adding fuel to the rally was a slew of positive macro triggers. The Consumer Price Index for June eased to 3.24%, signalling price stability ahead. Also, Pakistan posted its first annual current account surplus in 14 years, which came in at $2.1 billion. Remittances sent home by overseas Pakistanis broke record too, reaching $38.3 billion in FY25, with June inflows alone at $3.4 billion (up 8% YoY).
Car sales in June roared to 21,773 units, marking a 64% year-on-year (YoY) and 47% MoM surge, reflecting resurgence in consumer demand, Topline mentioned.
KTrade Securities remarked that stocks closed on a bullish note as energy names led the rally. The KSE-100 index swung between intra-day low of 139,084 and high of 140,215, ultimately advancing 978 points day-on-day to close at 139,390.
The rally followed the announcement of a successful Pakistan-US trade deal, which includes US support for exploiting local oil reserves, signalling potential investment in Pakistan’s energy sector, it said.
Arif Habib Limited (AHL) observed that trading above 140k continued to cap gains for the KSE-100. Some 60 shares rose while 39 fell, with Systems Limited (+7.5%), OGDC (+3.66%) and Pakistan Oilfields (+5.02%) contributing the most to index gains. On the other hand, Fauji Fertiliser (-1.41%), Bank Alfalah (-2.1%) and Engro Fertilisers (-0.73%) were the biggest drags.
AHL said that oil names were all well bid and saw the most traded value following comments from US President Donald Trump that his administration had struck a deal with Pakistan, under which Washington would work with Islamabad on developing oil reserves. However, there was no update on tariffs, which the market awaited.
Among corporate news, Bank Alfalah (-2.33%) announced first-half earnings per share (EPS) of Rs9.55, down 31% YoY, along with a dividend of Rs5 per share. Habib Bank (-0.58%) announced 1HCY25 EPS of Rs23.44, up 16% YoY, and declared a dividend of Rs9.
Heading into the last session of the week, the KSE-100 was up 0.13% week-on-week, with the possibility of hitting 140.5k, AHL added.
Overall trading volumes increased to 577.3 million shares compared with Wednesday’s tally of 425.8 million. Traded value stood at Rs36.3 billion. Shares of 483 companies were traded. Of these, 235 stocks closed higher, 215 fell and 33 remained unchanged.
The Bank of Punjab led volumes with trading in 83 million shares, rising Rs0.34 to close at Rs14.06. It was followed by Invest Bank with 37.2 million shares, gaining Rs0.23 to close at Rs8.99 and OGDC with 24.2 million shares, up Rs8.23 to close at Rs233.01. Foreign investors sold shares worth Rs146.7 million, the National Clearing Company reported.
KARACHI: The Board of Directors of Bank Alfalah Limited (BAFL), in its meeting held on Thursday, approved the Bank’s financial results for the half year ended June 30, 2025.
Bank Alfalah reported profit after tax (PAT) of Rs 15.27 billion for the half year ended June 30, 2025, translating to earnings per share of Rs 9.68 (June 2024: Rs 13.06). The Board of Directors declared a second interim cash dividend of Rs 2.50 per share (25%), cumulatively bringing the cash dividend for the year to Rs 5.00 per share (50%) (HY 2024: Rs 4.00 per share (40%).
The Bank was able to offset the impact of interest rate cut through current account growth. Further, balance sheet positions taken last year supported both net interest income as well as resulted in opportunities for capital gains. The changing dynamics of pricing of some products and remittances added pressure on the bottom line; we expect these will majorly settle in the second half of the year.
Total deposits closed at Rs 2.29 trillion. The Bank had shifted its deposit strategy towards mobilizing current account balances and granular sticky deposits to build a diversified and stable deposit base. Driven by the Bank’s strategic shift towards growing low risk corporate lending while gradually increasing consumer finance as interest rates become more conducive, the Bank’s loan book grew by 34.5% YoY to close at Rs 1,057.72 billion.
Further, following noticeable growth in the agriculture and small and medium enterprises (SMEs) segments over the years, the Bank will continue to prioritise credit expansion towards these segments, with tailored financing solutions to foster financial inclusion.
The Bank exercises strong capital management with a Capital Adequacy Ratio of 17.67% as at June 30, 2025, which is well above the minimum regulatory requirement.
Lingering at a day market for labourers in Panyu, an urban village on the outskirts of Guangzhou, Ms Qiu looks dejected. She is looking for a local factory that will hire her for the day to sew clothes – cheap tops and dresses that will be churned out on to China’s e-commerce platforms, or bundled up for export to western shoppers. But she is not having much luck.
“The whole industry is struggling, and now there is a high tariff on Chinese goods because of the trade war. Many foreign clients have decreased their orders from China,” she says, declining to give her first name.
Guangzhou, China’s southern metropolis and the capital of Guangdong province, is home to nearly 20 million people. It is also the humming, whirring and buzzing heart of the global fast fashion industry. In its urban villages, ramshackle settlements that have been absorbed into the city’s sprawl, millions of workers toil day and night in informal workshops to produce cheap garments. In one small, crowded factory, women sit behind sewing machines next to teetering mountains of starched black tutus. In another, pink denim jeans destined to be sold on fast fashion website Shein are piled high on every available worktop.
Every morning, workers gather in informal labour markets like the one in Panyu to see if they can find work for the day sewing on hundreds of buttons, or ironing hundreds of collars. Depending on the complexity of the task, workers earn between one and 10 yuan per item, toiling for long hours in cramped conditions.
A factory making jeans factory in Zengcheng. Photograph: Lillian Yang/The Guardian
“This is hard-earned money,” says a worker in his 60s in Datang, another urban village about ten miles north of Panyu. Ironing jackets at 8am, before packaging them up to be exported, the man, who declined to give his name, was part-way through a shift that had started at 11pm the night before. He earned two yuan per jacket, he said. More than a dozen garment workers interviewed by the Guardian all said that a normal working day was 10 to 12 hours, with some saying they only took one rest day each month.
‘Little room for profit’
While China’s domestic e-commerce market has boomed in recent years, it is overseas orders that keep the factory lights on. Around one-quarter of the more than $100bn of textiles and apparel imported to the US came from China last year. Guangdong alone exported more than $7bn, according to data from the Global Trade & Industry Growth Lab by Sinoimex, a commercial data firm.
But in April, Donald Trump, the US president, launched a trade war with China, which sent shockwaves through the global economy. Tariffs on Chinese goods reached 145%, with China responding with similar duties and trade restrictions, before the two countries agreed to a 90-day pause in May. With a 12 August deadline looming to reach a deal, workers in Guangzhou are wondering whether or not they’ll be able to keep selling clothes to Americans.
In Panyu, Yang Ruiping has run his small clothes factory, which specialises in tops and employs about 20 people, for two decades. About 30% of his orders are exported, mostly to Shein and Amazon, down from more than 50% before the pandemic. Although the pause in the trade war has eased the pressure on his business slightly, he still has “little confidence in the US”.
Yang Ruiping at his factory in Panyu. Photograph: Amy Hawkins/The Guardian
“In the recent US-China trade war, if the tariffs go up, we need to lower the production costs to combat it,” he says. “It leaves little room for profit”. With no room to cut wages any lower, Yang says he is already losing money on every top he sells. He keeps accepting the orders in order to keep the factory open, but with the domestic market becoming increasingly competitive, he is aware he might not be able to operate much longer.
Shein is everywhere in Panyu. The China-founded, Singapore-headquartered company revolutionised the garment industry in Guangzhou, allowing small manufacturers like Yang to sell directly to western customers, and offering shoppers rock-bottom prices. While big high street brands operate larger, dedicated factories, Shein places small batch orders directly with independent manufacturers, ramping up production for the designs that sell well online. The flexibility of this model has fuelled the company’s meteoric rise. Shein accounts for about 50% of the US fast fashion industry, according to Bloomberg Second Measure, a data analytics firm.
The company’s growth has also been thanks to a loopholes in the US customs regime, which allowed low-value goods to be imported free. In 2022, over 30% of all the small packages imported under the so-called “de minimis” exemption came from Shein and Temu, another Chinese e-commerce company. On 2 May, Trump closed that loophole for goods from China and Hong Kong. This week, he expanded that ban to goods from all countries, meaning that suppliers can’t avoid tariffs by shipping via third countries. A recent analysis by Reuters found that prices on Shein increased by an average of 23% between 24 April and 22 July.
The US market is “volatile and risky,” says Peng Jianshen, the boss of a medium-sized denim clothes factory in Zengcheng, another of Guangzhou’s urban villages. “When tariffs were suddenly increased, the entire US-focused production stopped. No one dared to continue”.
Experts say that the uncertainty of the trade war could have a negative impact on working conditions, encouraging workers to add hours to their already punishingly long shifts.
Rolls of denim outside a jeans factory in Zengcheng. Photograph: Lillian Yang/The Guardian
“Generally, when we’re talking about the garment industry in China, workers don’t have rest days,” says Li Qiang, the founder of China Labor Watch, a US-based NGO. “They’re paid by piece rate. So they work as much as possible when the orders are still there.”
But factory bosses in Guangzhou say the trade war is only the latest in a series of problems facing their industry. Global conflicts and low consumer spending in China mean that it’s hard to pivot away from the US and towards other markets.
Li Jun, a chain-smoking factory boss, runs a denim clothing factory that sells jeans to Russia. He says the economic impact of the war in Ukraine, plus the fact that many of his would-be customers have been drafted to fight in the conflict, have been bad for business. “The economy is not doing well anywhere,” he says. “A lot of factories are shutting down.” At his peak he was exporting 100,000 pairs of jeans per month, with more than half going to Russia, but now it’s 30,000 to 40,000 pairs each month, meaning that he just about breaks even.
Manufacturers in places like Guangzhou have long been the engine room of China’s growth. But in recent years, keen to shed the label of being the world’s factory, Beijing has been pouring all its political and economic support into hi-tech industries, such as artificial intelligence and semiconductors. “The Chinese government no longer supports these kinds of light industries or small individual businesses,” Li says. “It’s really hard to keep things going”.
Export-driven economies like Thailand have been scrambling for a trade deal to avoid President Trump’s steep tariffs
When US President Donald Trump made his dramatic tariff announcement on 2 April, nowhere was the shock greater than in South East Asia, a region whose entire world view and economic model is built on exports.
The levies went as high as 49% on some countries, hitting a range of industries from electronics exporters in Thailand and Vietnam to chip makers in Malaysia and clothing factories in Cambodia.
“I remember waking up in the morning. It was quite early, and seeing him standing there on the White House lawn with his board. I thought: ‘Did I see that right? 36%? How could it be?” says Richard Han, whose father founded Hana Microelectronics, one of Thailand’s biggest contract manufacturers.
Thailand, which was facing a 36% levy, now has a deal, like most of its neighbours, to reduce the tariffs to 19%.
The negotiations went down to the wire, finalised just two days before the deadline Trump had set – 1 August. It has been a fraught process getting there, and there is still very little detail about exactly what has been agreed.
BBC/ Lulu Luo
Richard Han says the 36% levy on Thailand was a “shock”
The 10 countries in Asean, as the South East Asian regional bloc is known, exported $477bn (£360bn) worth of goods to the United States in 2024. Vietnam is by far the most exposed economy, its exports to the US totalling $137bn, making up about 30% of its GDP.
No surprise then that the Vietnamese government was first off the block to negotiate with the US, and the first in the region to do a deal to cut the punishing 46% rate Trump had imposed on them.
According to the US president, the deal cuts the tariffs to 20%, while he claims Vietnam will now impose no tariffs at all on any imports from the US. Tellingly, the Vietnamese leadership has said nothing about the deal.
There are no details, no written or signed documents, and some reports suggest Vietnam does not agree with Trump’s numbers. But they set the bar for other countries in the region.
Indonesia and the Philippines followed with deals reducing their tariffs to 19%, although neither country depends much on exports to the US.
Thailand does export a lot to the US. Last year they earned it more than $63bn, about one-fifth of its total exports. Thailand too should have been at the head of the queue in Washington, pleading for a reduction in the 36% tariff Trump had designated for it.
Getty Images
Thailand’s acting Prime Minister Phumtham Wechayachai took office after the last PM stepped down over a political scandal
But Thailand is not Vietnam, a one-party communist state where critical decisions can be made quickly by a few leaders, with little need to worry about the opinions of businesses or the public.
Rather, like South Korea and Japan, whose deals came after much wrangling despite them being staunch American allies, Thailand too has to contend with domestic politics and public opinion. Thailand also has a weak and fractious coalition government, beholden to a range of vested interests.
Worse still, decisions it took which were entirely unrelated to trade angered the US side.
In February it sent 40 Uyghur asylum-seekers who had been stuck in Thailand for more than a decade back to China, defying warnings by the US Secretary of State Marco Rubio. One Thai trade official told the BBC the US negotiators were still bringing up the Uyghurs as a grievance at tariff talks in May.
Then a regional army commander filed a lèse-majesté complaint against a US academic, resulting in him being jailed and then forced to leave Thailand. So, far from being at the front, Thailand found itself at the back of the queue.
The other difficulty facing the Thai trade team was what the US was asking for in return for cutting the tariff rate, in particular access to Thailand’s agricultural market, which is heavily protected.
Food is big business in Thailand. CP Group, one of the world’s agribusiness giants, is the biggest company in the country. This US demand was painful for Thailand.
“Vietnam opened a Pandora’s box,” says another Thai trade official. “By offering zero percent tariffs on all US imports, they make it hard for those of us who can’t easily open up all sectors to US competition.”
BBC/ Lulu Luo
Zero tariffs on US pork imports would be a blow for Thailand’s pig farms
Three hours’ drive from Bangkok, in Nakhon Nayok, Worawut Siripun keeps 12,000 pigs – an important business in Thailand; Thais eat a lot of pork. He is active in the Thai Swine Raisers Association, and has been lobbying against eliminating tariffs on US pork.
“US farmers produce on a much bigger scale than us, and their costs are lower. So, the price of their pork will be lower, and domestic farmers won’t be able to survive.”
Access to the agricultural market was also a sticking point in negotiations with Japan, which sought to protect its rice farmers, and continues to be one of the main hurdles with India.
In Thailand, it is presumed that agribusiness giants like CP have also been lobbying against US demands to open up other sectors like poultry and corn. There have been fractious meetings between the trade team and cabinet ministers after every round of tariff talks in Washington, the BBC understands.
BBC/ Lulu Luo
Worawut Siripun says he cannot compete with US farmers who produce a lot more
But on the other side are Thailand’s manufacturers, who represent a much larger contribution to GDP than agriculture. They badly needed a deal.
“If we get 36% then it’s going to be terrible for us,” said Suparp Suwanpimolkul, deputy managing director of SK Polymer, before the deal was announced. The company makes a bewildering array of components from rubber and synthetic materials, for washing machines, fridges, air conditioners.
“I guarantee you would find at least one of our products in your home,” he said.
SK Polymer was founded by Suparp and his two brothers in 1991. Its story is the story of modern Thailand, originating from their father’s small family business, but riding the explosive growth of global trade which has been the foundation of Thailand’s economy.
They are an integral part of a complex supply chain, where their products join other components from multiple countries to make consumer, industrial or medical goods for export. About 20% of the company’s income comes from the US, but the number is much higher when products which contain its components are included. The Trump tariffs have thrown a spanner in the works.
“We have small margins,” said Suparp. He said they could still manage with tariffs up to 20% or even 25% by cutting costs.When he spoke to the BBC, before the deal was announced, he said the uncertainty was the biggest challenge: “Please – to our government, just get the deal, so we can plan our business.”
BBC/ Lulu Luo
A worker at SK Polymer, which makes rubber products for export to the US
A 20% levy is also palatable for electronics manufacturers, a big industry in Thailand.
“If all of us in this region end up with around 20% our buyers won’t seek alternative suppliers – it will just be a tax, like VAT, for US consumers,” says Richard Han, CEO of Hana Microelectronics. The company makes the basic components that go into everything in our digital lives: printed circuit boards, integrated circuits, RFID tags for pricing.
Mr Han says only about 12% of his products go to the US directly, but like SK Polymer the proportion that goes indirectly, as part of other manufactured goods, is much higher. But it is not just the tariff number that worries him.
His concern is trans-shipment, the US charge that China is avoiding tariffs by routing its production through South East Asia. Already Vietnam, according to President Trump, will pay 40% – double the new tariff rate – on goods the US judges to be trans-shipped.
Both Thailand and Vietnam saw foreign investment increase significantly after tariffs were imposed on China in the first Trump term, and their exports to the US rose as well. Some of that was Chinese companies moving production; some was products using a lot more Chinese-made components. And they are not just from China.
At another electronics manufacturer, SVI, robots glided up and down the assembly line bringing hundreds of tiny components to assemble circuit boards in machines that cost hundreds of thousands of dollars. A quick look at the labels showed the components came from Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan and China.
SVI makes security cameras, bespoke amplifiers, medical equipment, to whatever specification their customers, who are mainly in Scandinavia, want. Thailand’s vital manufacturing sector is part of an immensely complex global supply chain which is almost impossible to rearrange to meet the US president’s demands.
Under WTO rules a product is considered local if at least 40% of its value is added in the local manufacturing process, or if it has been “substantially transformed” into a new product, the way an iPhone becomes something different once it has been assembled.
BBC/ Lulu Luo
Electronics manufacturer SVI is one of many Thai companies that sits at the heart of a complex global supply chain
The Trump administration pays no heed to WTO rules, and it is not clear what will be counted as trans-shipped, but Mr Han fears this could prove a bigger problem for Thai companies than the standard tariff rate if the US insists on more local components, or fewer from China.
“South East Asia relies very heavily on China,” he explains. “China, by far, has the largest supply chain for electronics and many other industries, and they are the cheapest.
“We could buy materials from another part of the world. It would be a lot more expensive. But it would be virtually impossible for Thailand or Vietnam or the Philippines or Malaysia to get a very high threshold, say 50-60%, made within that country. And if that is the condition to get the US certificate of origin, then nobody’s going to get the certificate of origin.”
For the moment very few of these details have been revealed. Despite President Trump claiming he has got zero percent tariffs for US goods coming into the Philippines and Indonesia, both those countries have said this is not correct, and that much still needs to be negotiated.
For the Thai government, having started so late, and struggled to meet US demands, just getting a deal will have been a relief.
They will worry about how to make the deal work later, as the details are worked out, which typically takes years. And in that, they are far from alone – rich and developing economies alike are scrambling to keep up with Trump’s mercurial tariff policy.
“At some point this has to stop. Surely it has to stop?” Mr Han says. “The trouble is, we don’t know what the rules of the game are going to be, so we’re all milling around, just waiting to find out how to play the new game.”
Dr. Miller: Frozen shoulder, what is it? How do you treat it? Hi, I’m Dr. Miller. I’m here with Scope Radio, and I’m here with Dr. Bob Burks. He’s an orthopedic surgeon, and he’s in the Department of Orthopedics at the University of Utah. Bob, what is commonly known as “frozen shoulder”? What is that?
Dr. Burks: Well, frozen shoulder is where the ligaments, we call it the capsule, around the shoulder shrinks up and prevents motion at the bone socket joint in the shoulder. And people will come in, and it’s pain with activity, not so much necessarily a lot of pain with rest. Although they can have that but they start to move their arm, use their arm, and it can really be searing, significant pain.
Recognizing the Symptoms
Dr. Miller: So that tends to limit the movement. In my experience, in a couple of patients, is that they limit their movements over time, and pretty soon, they can’t move that shoulder at all.
Dr. Burks: Sure. Obviously, we see mild cases. We see cases where it’s almost, we might say, fused, where the bone socket really doesn’t move at all, and so there’s a span of that. But fortunately, it’s a very treatable problem. And some of my happiest patients are those who come in, and you can recognize it, manage it, get them past it, and their outcomes can be very good.
Dr. Miller: So, what is capsulitis? Is that a problem with the tissues surrounding the muscles of the shoulder, or is it a problem of the muscles themselves, or the ligaments?
Dr. Burks: So each joint in the body has a capsule, has a boundary that surrounds the joint that gives it some control of stability but allows motion in certain planes, and it contains the fluid in the joint that takes care of the cartilage. When that shrinks, scar stiffens, then it will limit the motion of the joint, so the muscle tendon is all outside that capsule. So the true frozen shoulder is not a muscle-tendon problem. It is a capsule ligament problem around the shoulder.
Treating Frozen Shoulder
Dr. Miller: So once one develops that, how do you treat it? Is it physical therapy? Do you do surgery? Is it medication?
Dr. Burks: Yeah, first of all, you just have to make the diagnosis. I think the biggest problem that patients have is they’ll see somebody who’s not as familiar and they’ll write it off as, “Well, it’s shoulder pain. Maybe a little arthritis. Maybe a rotator cuff problem.” So you have to make the diagnosis.
Once you have that, then clearly, therapy is important. I emphasize to the patient that they have to be the physical therapist. So this is something that they have to do five times a day, four times a day. The physical therapist is the coach, the guide, but not the end-all.
The other thing that we find very effective is an intra-articular corticosteroid injection. So when we make the diagnosis and we have them get a controlled, within-the-joint, corticosteroid injection, and then they start working their therapy, I’d say 80% of the people that I see back four weeks later will say, “I feel markedly better.” They may not have all their motion back, but they’ve made tremendous change. They say, “Hey, I know this is working.” Once they have that level of buy-in, then they just keep getting better.
Now, there are some who don’t, and we may have to get more aggressive with treatment, but the non-operative approach is very successful in a large number of people.
What to Expect From Recovery
Dr. Miller: So, at the end of this, I mean, basically, if a patient has some pain in the shoulder and they perceive that there’s less range of motion, perhaps less strength, got to have that checked out either by a sports medicine physician or a primary care physician. A good exam should be done by the physician in order to determine whether this is frozen shoulder or another problem with the shoulder joint.
Once that diagnosis is made, from what I understand, Bob, the corticosteroid injection helps, and then a referral to physical therapy for rather intensive physical therapy, and most of these patients get better in time. As you mentioned, these are very happy patients because at the end of their treatment sessions, they seem to be doing pretty well.
Dr. Burks: I think that’s a good summary. The reason patients are happy, most of them have had this as a long-going problem, several months. When they have something done and they see an absolute change, they see an improvement, then it makes it that much more appreciated because they’ve already struggled with it for such a long time. This isn’t a two-week problem. This was months.
updated: July 31, 2025 originally published: October 18, 2016
Dubai: A major shift is coming to the way we handle money in the UAE—and it’s called the Digital Dirham. It’s not crypto, and it’s not a bank reward scheme. This is official money—issued by the UAE Central Bank, backed by law, and powered by blockchain.
Here are 10 simple ways this digital currency will change your everyday financial life:
1. It’s your Dirham—just digital
The Digital Dirham is legal tender, just like the paper cash in your wallet. It holds the same value and will be accepted across shops, banks, and government services.
2. Cheaper, faster transfers
Say goodbye to waiting days or paying high fees. Digital Dirham allows for instant, low-cost transfers—especially great news for expats sending money home.
3. Secure, fraud-resistant
Built on blockchain, every transaction is traceable and recorded. That means fewer chances of fraud, loss, or theft.
4. Smart contracts make things easier
The currency can run on smart contracts—automating payments, rent, or instalments. It’s also compatible with tokenisation, opening up new ways to invest and transact.
5. Coming to your phone by late 2025
6. You’ll use it without needing a bank account
Even those without traditional bank access can use it. It’ll be available through banks, exchange houses, fintech apps, and via a Digital Dirham wallet.
7. It’ll make daily spending simpler
Use it to pay utility bills, shop at stores, or pay school fees—without cards or cash. Just tap and go, digitally.
8. It won’t replace your bank, just work smarter with it
Your bank stays, but fees drop. Digital Dirham works alongside your mobile apps—making settlements faster and smoother.
9. It’s part of a bigger digital future
The UAE’s FIT programme aims to build a fully digital economy. The new Dirham symbol (a D with two lines) marks this next-gen financial leap.
10. It’s just the beginning
Pay government fees using Digital Dirham
Buy online or in shops without swiping a card
Send money abroad digitally, without currency conversion delays
Use programmable money and tokenised assets for smarter investments
Key takeaways: Why it matters to you
Instant, low-cost transfers: Save money on remittance fees and get funds delivered faster.
Secure and traceable: A safer option than cash, with reduced fraud risk and full traceability.
Legal tender status: Use it confidently for daily purchases — it’s officially recognized.
No cash or bank account required: Ideal for those without traditional banking access — just go digital.
The Digital Dirham is the UAE’s next big step—shaping the future of payments, remittances, and financial innovation. Stay tuned: by late 2025, your cash might just live on your phone.
Justin is a personal finance author and seasoned business journalist with over a decade of experience. He makes it his mission to break down complex financial topics and make them clear, relatable, and relevant—helping everyday readers navigate today’s economy with confidence.
Before returning to his Middle Eastern roots, where he was born and raised, Justin worked as a Business Correspondent at Reuters, reporting on equities and economic trends across both the Middle East and Asia-Pacific regions.
A sub-committee of the NA Standing Committee on Information Technology met on Thursday to review the ongoing issue of outstanding dues owed by Long Distance and International (LDI) companies to the PTA.
The panel decided to seek legal opinion from the Ministry of Law regarding the recovery issue.
During the meeting, the PTA chairman stated that the authority is not empowered to allow installment-based payments for the recovery of dues from LDI operators. “PTA does not have the authority to restructure or defer the payment of dues in installments,” he said.
The PTA chairman added that several rounds of meetings have been held with defaulting LDI companies, but their stance on dues repayment continues to differ.
“After hearing their views, we have issued letters to the companies, and a clear decision has been communicated; outstanding dues must be paid in full, including late payment charges,” he noted.
The LDI representatives stated that they had offered the PTA to pay the principal amount in installments and expressed readiness to issue post-dated cheques.
The PTA insisted that all dues, including late fees, must be deposited into an escrow account.
The LDI representatives maintained that there was a lack of clarity in government policy regarding the renewal of their licenses.
The IT secretary observed that the issue of dues with the LDI companies was not “straightforward”, noting that each company had a different position. “Whatever decision the government takes will set a precedent for dues recovery in other sectors as well,” he noted.
The PTA chairman revealed that not all LDI companies have agreed to pay the principal amount.
