Finance Minister Ishaq Dar predicted the US dollar would fall below Rs. 200 against the Pakistani rupee without government intervention nearly four years ago. Today, the exchange rate remains close to Rs. 300 per dollar, nearly Rs. 100 above the level he had forecast.

Dar made the remarks in September 2022, days after taking charge as finance minister in the PML-N government. In a televised interview, he said the government would neither intervene in the foreign exchange market nor spend Pakistan’s foreign exchange reserves to strengthen the rupee, insisting the market was correcting itself.

Responding to a question about the exchange rate, Dar said the dollar would fall below Rs. 200 and described it as “a matter of days, not weeks.” He maintained that the rupee had been pushed down by speculation, political uncertainty, and market psychology rather than underlying economic fundamentals.

Dar also argued that the narrowing gap between interbank and open market exchange rates showed that confidence in the rupee was returning. According to him, investors and traders had begun unwinding their dollar positions because they no longer expected the currency to continue appreciating.

He further claimed that exchange market participants were voluntarily bringing the dollar down, thanking them for what he described as acting in Pakistan’s national interest instead of responding to government pressure.

The interview has resurfaced on social media, with users revisiting Dar’s prediction as the dollar continues to trade close to Rs. 300 against the rupee, years after he said it would drop below Rs. 200 without intervention.