This blog is dedicated to those 74% people of Pakistan who survive on daily income of US$2 or less.
It is maintained by Yousuf Nazar, Farrukh Siddiqui, and their friends and welcomes contributions and posts from all those who care about Pakistan.
Yousuf Nazar is an independent investment consultant with extensive experience in investment management, strategic planning, credit, and commercial banking in the global markets. He is also the author of a book, ‘The Gathering Storm - Political Economy of a Security State’, published (Royal Book Co. Ltd) in March 2008. He worked for Citigroup for 18 years and was the head of its highly profitable emerging markets public investments group when he left Citigroup London in December 2005. In this capacity he helped manage its proprietary listed equity portfolio across Asia, Latin America, Eastern Europe, Middle East and Africa. He managed Citibank’s impaired equity portfolio in the aftermath of the market crash in 2000-2001 and led the remedial effort of the equity portfolio of Banamex Mexico that was acquired by Citibank in 2001.
Yousuf Nazar’s experience in private equity investments included financial institutions in the UK and Eastern Europe. He also has experience of investing in other sectors including technology, pharmaceuticals, textiles, energy, and consumer products. During 2001-2005, he was also the macro risk manager of Citigroup’s entire public and private equity portfolio of over $3 billion and was responsible for sovereign, foreign exchange and funding risks.
Before 2001, he was the Director of Citigroup’s Strategic Planning group, in which capacity he was part of team that dealt with the financial crises in Asia and Russia during the 1997-1998 and formulated the strategic acquisitions strategy for the bank. He has acquisition deals experience in
Yousuf Nazar has travelled extensively throughout the developing world. Since 2006, he has written articles on economic and financial issues. In an article published on October 1, 2007 in DAWN, he warned about the probable recession in the U.S. and its repercussions on the emerging markets. He has been quoted by magazines such as TIME, Newsweek, Business Week, and think-tanks such as Carnegie Endowment and the Council on Foreign Relations. He has been interviewed by networks and agencies such as GEO, AAJ, ARY, CNBC, VOA, Bloomberg, AFP, AP and Al-Jazeera.
He did his masters (with distinction) in international finance and economics in 1987 and bachelors in administrative studies (with distinction) in 1986 from