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Iran’s imports of gasoline grew 12-fold under Rouhani administration – sanctions still force Tehran to pay costs
Iran cuts crude prices to counter Saudi’s price war
Kerry asks foreign companies not to use US as excuse to avoid business with Iran
A Malaysian delegation in Tehran
Tehran to host two int’l exhibitions on energy and transport next week Top News Stories
Iran’s imports of gasoline grew 12-fold under Rouhani administration – sanctions still force Tehran to pay costs
Sanctions are gone but banking issues still make headache for Tehran as the Islamic Republic continues resorting to strategies such as exchanging crude oil with gasoline, or gives attractive discounts to maintain its Asian oil customers.
Mehr News Agency wrote on Wednesday that the volume of Iran’s import of gasoline during the three years of President Rouhani’s term in office has grown from 1 million liters per day to 12 million liters per day, and the figure is expected to reach 15 million liters a day this year. Abbas Kazemi, the deputy Petroleum Minister and managing director of National Iranian Oil Refining & Distribution Company (NIORDC) has said the purpose of this significant surge in gasoline imports is enhancing the country’s storage capacity of this fuel.
At a time when the country still faces problem in repatriating its oil sale proceeds, the exchange of crude oil with oil products such as gasoline seems to be a viable solution. On Feb 25th, Bloomberg had reported that since foreign banks continue being ―super cautious‖ in issuing letters of credit for Iran-linked trades, Iran is offering to swap exports of crude oil for imports of refined fuel. In their interview with Bloomberg at that time, three Iranian officials—without giving their names—confirmed that NIOC is offering products such as fuel oil in exchange for imports of gasoline and is also willing to swap crude for fuel. Mehr News Agency had reported on February 28th that NIOC has concluded an agreement with three Swiss companies, namely Glencore plc, Vitol and Trafigura, on a barter arrangement for the exchange of crude oil with gasoline.
...Iran cuts crude prices to counter Saudi’s price war
In a separate development, Reuters wrote on May 9th that in order to counteract Saudi’s strategy of using low oil price as a confrontation weapon against the Islamic Republic, Iran has set the official selling price of its oil for June delivery to Asia at $1.60 a barrel below the Dubai/Oman average.
In an address to a local conference on Sunday, Petroleum Minister Bijan Zangeneh had confirmed that the country is now in ―an unwritten oil war‖ with Saudis and disclosed that they approach the Iranian oil customers and propose a $3 a barrel price discount. Zangeneh’s proclamation was echoed by NIOC Managing Director Rokneddin Javadi who told reporters on the sidelines of the oil exhibition that Riyadh approaches Iran’s customers and offers them tempting discounts.
Daily coverage of negotiations with foreign companies post-sanctions, latest macroeconomic data, banking and financial developments, economic events to watch...
Iran News Brief
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2 ...and Riyadh also eyes undermining Iran’s role in global gas market
In a report published on Wednesday, the reformist daily Shargh accused the Saudi leadership of spreading its energy war against Iran to the natural gas front by making hurdles for Iran’s gas export plans through pipelines. ―After its failure to prevent Iran’s export increase plans by oil freeze scheme and also its failure in banning vessels that transport Iranian crude oil, now Saudi Arabia has shown financial support for the planned TAPI Pipeline as an alternative route for transferring natural gas to India and Pakistan.‖ Shargh’s report refers to a report published on May 2nd by Trend news agency (a media outlet at Azerbaijan) which stated that President of Turkmenistan has invited Saudi Arabian companies and financial institutions to take part in the construction project of TAPI transnational gas pipeline. In response, Mansur Moazzami, the president of the energy &
environment commission of Tehran Chamber of Commerce, Industry & Mine (TCCIM) told Shargh that Saudis’ possible engagement in TAPI project would certainly be a political move to undermine Iran’s position in global energy market. Moazzami however casts doubt if the TAPI project would be successful given the grave security concerns coming from Taliban and al-Qaeda forces in Afghanistan.
The Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) is a 1600-kilometer natural gas pipeline, with a projected cost of $10 billion that would transit about 33 billion cubic meters (bcm) of Turkmen gas over a period of three decades to Afghanistan, Pakistan and India. India and Pakistan would each receive 42 percent of the transit and Afghanistan the remaining 16 percent. TAPI is considered as an alternative to a long-negotiated pipeline called Iran Pakistan-India (IPI), or Iran-Pakistan (IP) pipeline which was supposed to deliver Iranian gas to Pakistan and thereon to India (India has withdrawn from the project over its dispute with Pakistan).
Source of the Image: Oriental Review (Open Dialogue Research Journal)
3 Kerry asks foreign companies not to use US as excuse to avoid business with Iran
Ahead of a meeting with European banks to discuss the Iranian issue, US Secretary of State John Kerry said foreign companies should not use the US as an excuse if they don’t want to do business with Iran, Reuters reported on Tuesday. According to Reuters, Kerry is scheduled to meet representatives of European banking institutions1 in London today to address their concerns in this regard. "It's important to have clarity and the clarity is that European banks, as long as it's not a designated entity, are absolutely free to open accounts for Iran, trade, exchange money, facilitate a legitimate business agreement, bankroll it, lend money - all those things are absolutely open," Kerry said.
Foreign Delegations in Iran
Malaysia DATO ZULKIFLI, the Malaysian deputy minister of International Trade & Industry led delegation of 37 his country’s executive directors and representatives of 27 private companies that are visiting Tehran to negotiate with their Iranian counterparts. The delegation arrived in Tehran on Monday on a four-day business mission and evaluates cooperation in Anzali Free Zone in northern province of Gilan, along with the business opportunities in the Kish, Qeshm and Kashan free and trade zones.
Events and Exhibitions:
4th Int’l Exhibition of Transportation &
Related Industries &
Equipment
15-18 May 2016
Ali Mohtasham-Amiri, the secretary of the exhibition said 350 domestic companies and representatives of 110 foreign firms will participate at the event, which would be the biggest one in the Middle East region. He said concurrently, the 1st Oil, Rail & Ports Int’l Conference & Rail Expo will be held on May 15.
1British banks including Barclays, HSBC and Standard Chartered as well as some lenders from other European countries are expected to attend
