Washington, Jan 29 (IANS) US Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said that job growth has slowed in part because of a sharp decline in labour supply driven by lower immigration. Powell on Wednesday (local time) said labour market conditions “may be stabilising after a period of gradual softening.” He said the unemployment rate was 4.4 per cent in December and has “changed little in recent months.”But job growth has been weak. “Total nonfarm payrolls declined at an average pace of 22,00…
Latest inflation News & Updates
Washington, Jan 29 (IANS) The Federal Reserve held interest rates steady. Chair Jerome Powell said inflation is still “somewhat elevated,” with tariffs pushing up goods prices.The Federal Open Market Committee “decided to leave our policy rate unchanged,” Powell told reporters on Wednesday (local time). The Fed kept the target range for the federal funds rate at 3.5 per cent to 3.75 per cent.Powell said the economy “expanded at a solid pace last year” and is starting 2026 “on a fir…
New Delhi, Jan 26 (IANS) Pakistan’s economy continues to survive on external support rather than real reform, as policymakers rely on foreign borrowing and strategic alliances to avoid repeated financial collapse, a report has said.For decades, Pakistan has faced recurring economic crises, only to be rescued each time by foreign creditors, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), or friendly nations, according to an analysis by Sakariya Kareem.Instead of building a competitive export-driven econ…
New Delhi, Jan 21 (IANS) The year-on-year inflation rates based on the all-India consumer price index for agricultural labourers (CPI-AL) and rural labourers (CPI-RL) for December 2025 have been estimated at 0.04 per cent and 0.11 per cent, respectively, figures released by the Ministry of Labour & Employment on Wednesday showed.The food inflation for agricultural and rural labourers stayed in the negative — (-) 1.8 per cent and (-) 1.73 per cent. respectively — as prices of food items fel…
New Delhi, Jan 20 (IANS) The private large-scale manufacturing (LSM) sector, the rise in unemployment and the rise in the average national wage between 2020-21 and 2024-25 in Pakistan challenges the government’s industrial growth data claims, according to a new report.Anjum Ibrahim writes in Business Recorder that the “government narrative on the state of the economy, not surprisingly, remains extremely upbeat though there are periodic glimpses of a deep-seated concern, given the palpable ge…
Mumbai, Jan 19 (IANS) India continued to remain the fastest-growing major economy in the world, with GDP growth estimated at 7.4 per cent, according to the latest Market Pulse report released by the National Stock Exchange of India on Monday.The report highlights strong macroeconomic stability, rising investor participation, and record fund-raising activity in capital markets during 2025.As per the First Advance Estimates, India’s economic growth stayed well ahead of global peers, supported by…
Mumbai, Jan 19 (IANS) The stakeholder sentiment in India’s property market stabilised with a positive bias at the end of 2025, as market enters 2026 on steadier footing, a report said on Monday.The report from Knight Frank and NAREDCO showed that the ‘Current Sentiment Score’ edged up to 60 in Q4 2025, up from 59 in Q3, while ‘the Future Sentiment Score’ was 61, unchanged from the prior quarter, both remaining in the “optimistic zone.””The readings underscore a market supported by improving ma…
Washington, Jan 16 (IANS) The International Monetary Fund (IMF) on Thursday said it is closely watching global energy markets amid tensions around Venezuela and Iran, but noted that oil prices have not yet seen “very significant impacts.”Asked how serious the current tensions surrounding Venezuela and Iran could be for global energy markets, Julie Kozack, Director of the IMF’s Communications Department, said: “What I can say for now is that obviously we’re monitoring all of this closely….
Seoul, Jan 15 (IANS) South Korea’s central bank again left its benchmark interest rate unchanged on Thursday as a weakened won and rising inflation concerns limited room for further easing.In a widely expected decision, the Monetary Policy Board of the Bank of Korea (BOK) held the key rate at 2.5 per cent at its rate-setting meeting in Seoul, marking the fifth consecutive on-hold decision since July, reports Yonhap news agency.”Inflation is expected to gradually decline, though the elevated exch…
New Delhi, Jan 14 (IANS) Pakistan’s Household Integrated Economic Survey (HIES), published after a gap of six years, exposes the extreme level of poverty in the country with food-insecure households surging from 15.9 per cent in 2018 to 2019 to a staggering 24.4 per cent in 2024 to 2025, according to a report in the local media.The HIES figures confirm Pakistan’s deepening human development crisis amid shrinking incomes, rising poverty, and widening inequality resulting from the prolonged sp…