ISLAMABAD:Pakistan Wednesday signed a $2.3 billion loan facility agreement with a Chinese consortium of banks which is expected to aid the depleting foreign exchange reserves and depreciation of local currency.

Finance Minister Miftah Ismail announced the development on his Twitter handle, revealing that the inflows are expected within a couple of days.

“We thank the Chinese government for facilitating this transaction,” he said.

Pakistan is likely to receive the loan in couple of days. Pakistan is currently facing a huge problem of depleting foreign reserves with US dollar thrashing Pakistani rupee continuously as it touched historic high of Rs212 on Wednesday.

Pakistan is desperately trying to win an IMF deal but it is still looks a couple of weeks away from reaching consensus.

IMF’s Resident Representative to Pakistan Esther Perez Ruiz said the discussions between the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and Pakistan are underway and major progress has been made regarding the budget for the next fiscal year.

On Tuesday night, Pakistan and the IMF evolved a broader agreement on the budget 2022-23 to revise upward the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) target and slash down the expenditures to achieve a revenue surplus in the next fiscal year.

Pakistan and the Fund staff achieved substantial progress to strike a consensus on budget 2022-23 and now the IMF will share a draft Memorandum of Economic and Financial Policies (MEFP) on coming Friday or Monday.