Sowingseeds

Pakistan’s interest rates are expected to rise, driving a demand from corporates to hedge their exposures. As the government relaxes rules that require individual approval for each derivatives transaction, the derivatives market looks set to grow. By Joseph Radford

Derivatives and Pakistan are not words that people often use in the same sentence. But that should start to change over the next couple of years, driven by Pakistan’s corporate appeal for new methods to hedge risk and a regulatory regime that appears highly receptive to the introduction of new financial instruments.

“The future [for Pakistan’s derivatives markets] is exceptionally bright,” says Sam Al-Amiri, London-based head of interest rate derivatives for the region covering