KARACHI: The upward journey of the rupee against the dollar in both open and interbank market further shed the value of one tola and 10 gram gold by Rs1,850 and Rs1,586, respectively. On the contrary, local bike assemblers have come with new price shocks.

Atlas Honda Ltd informed its authorised dealers on Monday about the third price jump in various models by Rs600-5,000, effective from Aug 1.

The CB150 bike will cost Rs172,000 as against Rs167,000 while CD-70cc’s price has been raised to Rs65,500 from Rs64,900. Pridor 100cc and CG-125cc will have new price tags of Rs90,900 and Rs110,900, up from Rs89,900 and Rs109,900, respectively.

AHL had already increased prices twice – first in January by Rs500-1,000 and then in April by Rs500-3,000 despite achieving over 94 per cent localisation.

NJ Auto Industries has decided to surge prices of Super Power bikes by Rs1,000 from Aug 5. Many Chinese bike and auto rickshaw assemblers have already jacked up the rates by Rs1,000-4,000 during July 23 to August 1 due to rupee’s losing strength and rising material prices in the market.

DS Motors Ltd has also enhanced the price of Unique 70cc-125cc bikes by Rs1,000-2,000 from Aug 1.

Prior to current improving health of the rupee, car assemblers have already passed on the impact to consumers in view of the local currency’s depreciation against the dollar from January to July and increase of 1pc additional import duty.

In July, Honda Atlas Cars Pakistan made its third price jump of Rs30,000-100,000 on various models. The company first raised rates in January by Rs50,000-60,000 while second price increase was made in March by Rs20,000-100,000.

Pak Suzuki Motor Company Ltd had made third price hike by Rs20,000-30,000 in June, after Rs20,000-50,000 raise in March and Rs10,000-20,000 in January.

Indus Motor Company (IMC) had also pushed up price three times in the last six months.

It is not clear whether the powerful lobby of assemblers would reduce prices after rupee recovery against the greenback or would further raise prices to cover up previous impact of the exchange rate.

When contacted, the spokesman of IMC simply said “Let’s wait and see as the rupee is very volatile.”

On the other hand, local one tola and 10 grams gold price further tumbled by Rs1,850 and Rs1,586 on Monday to reach Rs54,500 and Rs46,725, respectively despite no change in world gold price at $1,224 per ounce.

Domestic gold prices had been on the downward trajectory from July 21 owing to improving value of the rupee against the dollar in the open and interbank markets.

From July 21 to date, the price of one tola and 10 grams gold has plunged by Rs5,550 and Rs4,758 respectively. The price of one tola and 10-gram on July 21 stood at Rs60,050 and Rs51,483 while the world gold price was $1,233 per ounce.

Published in Dawn, July 31st, 2018