Following Pakistan’s staff-level agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) over the weekend, Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) Monday witnessed a bullish trend as the KSE-100 benchmark index gained over 2,200 points.

In an extraordinary turn of events, the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) experienced a remarkable surge in its indices on the first working day following the successful conclusion of a highly anticipated $3 billion deal with the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

The stock market halted briefly within the first 10 minutes of trading as the KSE30 index soared by an impressive 5%, causing the session to restart later at 10:37 pm.

The KSE100 index, a prominent benchmark of market performance, displayed a significant upswing of 2,231.1 points to reach 43,683.78 points.

On Friday, IMF reached a staff-level agreement with Pakistan on a $3 billion stand-by arrangement.

The international lender said this in a statement – a decision long awaited by the country that is teetering on the brink of default.

The deal, subject to approval by the IMF board in July, comes after an eight-month delay and offers some respite to Pakistan, which is battling an acute balance of payments crisis and falling foreign exchange reserves.

The $3 billion funding, spread over nine months, is higher than expected for Pakistan.

The country was awaiting the release of the remaining $2.5 billion from a $6.5 billion bailout package agreed in 2019, which expired on Friday.

The new agreement will support Pakistan’s immediate efforts to stabilize the economy from recent external shocks, preserve macroeconomic stability and provide a framework for financing from multilateral and bilateral partners, the IMF says.