term loans to shoot up to an all time high of 60 per cent. Dhedhi said the directors of Karachi Stock Exchange in a meeting with the state watchdog, the Securities Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP), had demanded a cap on interest rates at 24 per cent. Dhedhi said the meeting was still going on and no decision was taken so far whether the SECP would convince the financial institutions to lower the interest rates for brokers. Some brokers have borrowed billions of Pakistani rupees (one US dollar equals to 80 rupees) from banks to buy shares. "Many top guns of the market are at the verge of bankruptcy," said Mudassar Malik director at the BMA Capital Management. Though the central State Bank of Pakistan has pumped more than 20 billion rupees (240 million dollars) in the money market this week the interest rates kept climbing. Pakistan is currently facing inflation of more than 25 per cent and a widening current-account deficit of over 14 billion dollars. The country's currency has depreciated by 22 per cent since January.
