The Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) registered 2,504 new companies in June 2021, indicating a growth of 63 percent as compared to the corresponding period last year, says a press release.
With the inclusion, the total number of registered companies has reached 145,913.
Ninety-nine percent of these were incorporated online and 45 percent of applicants were issued registration certificates the same day, whereas 203 new foreign users were registered during the month.
Of the newly registered companies, 65 percent were registered as private limited companies, 31 percent as single-member companies and four percent as public unlisted companies, not-for-profit associations, foreign companies and limited liability partnership (LLP). Total capitalisation (paid-up capital) of newly incorporated companies for the current month is Rs3.3 billion.
The construction and real estate sector took the lead with the incorporation of 474, trading with 382, IT with 275, services with 216, e-commerce with 129, food and beverages with 105, textile with 86, corporate agricultural farming with 76, education with 66, engineering, and market and development 54 each, pharmaceutical with 50, healthcare with 45, tourism with 39, mining and quarrying, and transport with 36 each, chemical with 34, auto and allied with 33, cables and electric goods with 31, logging with 27, communication with 26, power generation with 24, paper and board, and cosmetics and toiletries with 19 each, steel and allied with 18, broadcasting and telecasting, and fuel and energy with 16 each, wood and wood products with 13 and 105 companies were registered in other sectors.
Foreign investment has been reported in 66 new companies. These companies have foreign investors from Austria, Azerbaijan, Bangladesh, China, France, Germany, Ghana, Hong Kong, Iran, Italy, Kyrgyzstan, Malawi, Mexico, the Netherlands, Nigeria, Oman, Philippines, Qatar, Russia, Singapore, Slovakia Republic, Sweden, Syria, Turkey, the UK, Uruguay and the US.
The highest numbers of companies, i.e. 810 were registered in Islamabad, followed by 807 and 394 companies registered in Lahore and Karachi, respectively. The CROs in Peshawar, Multan, Faisalabad, Gilgit-Baltistan, Quetta and Sukkur registered 174, 127, 98, 62, 22, and 10 companies respectively.
