SECP: 16% growth in company registrations in FY2013-14

The Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) registered 4,587 new companies in financial year 2013-14, raising the total corporate portfolio to 64,067 companies. This represents a 16% growth in companies registered when compared to a total of 3953 companies registered during the FY 2012-13.

The growth in corporate registration indicates a very healthy trend and a paradigm shift towards documentation.  It is also a sign of favorable economic policies of the government for corporates. Services, I.T., construction, communications and power generation sectors are showing decent growth, reflecting the good measures taken by the government for these sectors in particular, and all other sectors in general.

One of the major contributors to the corporate growth is the government’s rationalization of the corporate tax regime. In this regard, the SECP has long been persistently making proposals for a rational corporate tax structure. The present government took the SECP’s proposals into account, while announcing the budget last year, and that is bearing fruit now.

The trading sector took the lead in new registrations with the incorporation of 543 companies, followed by major sectors of services with 518, tourism with 421, information and technology with 366, construction with 300, corporate agricultural farming with 195, communications with 173, food and beverages with 165, textile with 140, education with 132, pharmaceutical with 128, power generation with 123, and engineering with 107 companies.

Foreign investment was witnessed in 220 new companies. These companies have foreign investors from 50 different countries, including Australia, Canada, China, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Kuwait, South Korea, Netherlands, Qatar, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, UAE, UK and the US. These companies have been registered in diverse sectors, ranging from trading, information technology, mining and quarrying, construction, communications, power generation, services, textile, corporate agricultural farming, food and beverages, transport, pharmaceutical, engineering, auto and allied, education, real estate development, tourism, cables and electric goods, healthcare, chemical, ginning, leather and tanneries, paper and board, sport goods, steel and allied, to  the vanaspati sector.

In FY 2013-14,  the highest number of companies, i.e.  1526, were registered at the Company Registration Office (CRO), Lahore, followed by 1251 and 1087 companies registered at CROs in Islamabad and Karachi. The CROs in Multan, Peshawar and Faisalabad registered 260, 233, and 150 companies respectively. The Quetta CRO registered 66, while the Sukkur CRO registered 14 companies.

During the FY 2013-14, returns for an increase in the authorized capital of 897 companies were accepted, with total authorized capital increment of Rs182 billion. In addition, 1151 companies filed returns for increase in the paid-up capital with the total enhancement amounting to Rs142 billion.