For the past five years, the KSE-100 index has been the best performing stock exchange in the Asia's emerging economies. Declared as the Asia's best performing market for the year 2002, the KSE-index has shed 34.7 percent since the beginning of 2008.
KSE-100 index rose to more than 112 percent in the year 2002 and turned the Asia's best performer followed by Sri Lanka, Thailand and Indonesia.
The foreign investors were expecting political stability after the February general election, but the country continued to witness political and economic uncertainty despite formation of a political government. So it is now time for the Government to safeguard the interest of the capital markets in Pakistan.
No country can think of prosperity without developing equity market. It is a signal to the authorities to take appropriate measures to save the economy before it is too late. It will be suicidal to allow running the equity market at the present pace and pattern for indefinite period.
The current Pakistani government should take into account that most governments around the world are intervening to save their industries and markets. The days of the 'hands off policy' are over in view of the prevailing global financial crisis.