The Pakistani rupee recorded minor gains against the dollar in the interbank foreign exchange market on Monday, the first trading session of the week.

The greenback shed five paisas and was trading at Rs279.85 at the closing of the market as against the closing of Rs279.9 on Friday, December 19.

In the open market, the buying of the dollar was recorded at Rs279.3 while it was quoted at Rs281.3 for selling at the time of filing the story.

Meanwhile, Pakistan’s foreign exchange reserves declined by $111 million during the week ended on January 12 due to external debt servicing.

The total liquid foreign exchange reserves held by the country stood at $13.145 billion as of Jan 12, compared with $13.256 billion on Jan 5.

During the week under review, SBP’s reserves decreased by $127 million to $8.027 billion down from $8.154 billion due to debt repayments.

However, net foreign reserves held by commercial banks witnessed an upward trend and rose by $16 million to $5.118 billion at the end of last week.

Since crossing the Rs300 mark a few months ago, the value of the dollar has slowly decreased in the face of a crackdown by the government against hoarding and smuggling.

The local currency started to make some ground against the dollar in interbank and open markets after the International Monetary Fund reached a staff-level agreement with Pakistan on a $3 billion stand-by agreement in July 2023.