PSO tops ICAP’s 100-company list

ISLAMABAD: The Institute of Chartered Accountants of Pakistan’s (ICAP) list of top 100 corporations of the country has ranked Pakistan State Oil (PSO) at top position. PSO’s achievement is based on meeting ICAP’s criteria set under the category of ‘revenue wise top performing companies.’

PSO reported 21.1 per cent higher revenue to Rs1,097 billion in FY17 compared to Rs906bn in FY16.

It also reported 76.7pc more profit-after-tax to Rs18.2bn in FY17 compared to Rs10.3bn in FY16. In a statement, Managing Director and CEO of PSO Sheikh Imranul-Haque said “our focused strategy has witnessed a phenomenal growth across PSO’s business portfolios in recent years, our planned expansion into the non-fuel retail business will also add to the brand’s value as we are growing into a company that offers multiple services to its customers across its fuel and non-fuel segments.”—Staff Repoter

Rs63m Karandaaz grant for SMEs

KARACHI: Karandaaz Pakistan, a non profit organisation working for financial inclusion of individuals, small and medium enterprises (SMEs), will provide a fixed grant of over Rs63 million to Bank Alfalah Ltd for Supply Chain Financing Advisory Services.

An agreement between the two was signed on Wednesday to build the capacity of the bank, providing credit to SME enterprises using cutting edge financial products through especially trained teams.

Separate agreements were also signed between Karandaaz and three business incubators- Lahore University of Management Sciences Balochistan University of Information Technology, Engineering and Management, and Invest2Innovate (Pvt) Ltd to launch a country-wide programme for supporting women entrepreneurship with a grant of Rs25m.

Karandaaz has financial and institutional support from the UK’s Department for International Development and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.—Staff Reporter

Rosneft invests in Iraq’s Kurdistan

LONDON: Russian state oil major Rosneft has agreed to invest $400 million in five oil blocks in Iraqi Kurdistan, increasing Moscow’s exposure to the semi-autonomous region despite a major spike in tensions with the central government in Baghdad.

Rosneft has previously loaned Kurdistan $1.2 billion guaranteed by oil sales and is seeking to help Erbil build two major oil and gas pipelines as part of President Vladimir Putin’s drive to regain influence in the Middle East.

Published in Dawn, October 19th, 2017