ISLAMABAD, Oct 17: The Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) has registered 920 companies in the first quarter of the current financial year.

The new monthly incorporations were 347, 309 and 264 in July, August and September respectively, show the commission’s official statistics released here on Tuesday. The Company Registration Office (CRO) Lahore registered the most number of companies 324, CRO Karachi 285 and CRO Islamabad 211.

The CROs at Peshawar, Faisalabad, Multan, Quetta and Sukkur registered 42, 28, 17, nine and four companies respectively.

Of the 920 companies, 898 were limited by shares comprising 21 public unlisted companies, 840 private companies, and 37 single member companies. In addition, the commission also registered 11 foreign companies, nine associations not-for-profit and two companies limited by guarantee.

Total authorised capital and paid-up capital of the companies limited by shares amounted to Rs50.881 billion and Rs2.102 billion, respectively.

The services sector recorded 161 new incorporations, followed by 121 in trading, 64 in Information Technology, 59 in communication, 50 in fuel and energy, 49 in the real estate development, 38 in construction and 37 in textile sector.

The SECP encourages and facilitates corporatisation of all businesses so that the corporate sector contributes towards the economic development of the country, a statement issued here stated.