ISLAMABAD - The Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) has registered 1,070 new companies in September this year.

The SECP on Thursday said that 74 percent of 1070 new companies were registered within four hours. As compared to the corresponding month of last financial year, it represents a growth of 50 percent, raising the number of registered companies to 90,722.

The massive increase in incorporation is the result of the SECP’s various reforms measures, i.e. introduction of simplified combined process for name reservation and incorporation, reduction of fee, assistance of incorporation by facilitation wings of CROs etc.

Around 73 percent companies were registered as private limited companies, while around 25 percent were registered as single-member companies. Two percent were registered as public unlisted, non-profit associations, foreign companies and limited liability partnership (LLP).

The trading sector took the lead with the incorporation of 189 companies, construction with 142, services with 137, I.T. with 107, tourism with 83, food and beverages with 45, real estate development with 34, corporate agricultural farming with 29, textile with 28, engineering with 26, education with 20, transport with 18, marketing and advertisement with 16, healthcare, and pharmaceutical with 14 each, cables and electric goods with 13, auto allied, and paper products with 12 each, logging, and mining and quarrying with 11 each and 109 companies were registered in other sectors. Moreover, 1 foreign company was also registered by CRO Islamabad. The SECP’s has introduced reforms to increase corporatization and register companies within four hours.

Foreign investment has been reported in 34 new companies. These companies have foreign investors from, Australia, Belarus, China, Denmark, Germany, Iran, Korea South, Malaysia, the Netherlands, Russia, Thailand and the UK.

The highest numbers of companies, i.e. 374 were registered in Islamabad, followed by 296 and 195 companies registered in Lahore and Karachi respectively. The CROs in Peshawar, Multan, Faisalabad, Gilgit-Baltistan, Quetta, and Sukkur registered, 83, 43, 28, 27, 20 and 4 companies respectively.