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m m a a i i l l I I r r a a n n E E c c o o n n o o m m y y U U p p d d a a t t e e
Issue 138/2016 – Monday December 19th Iran’s oil supplies to Europe hits new record high post-sanctions
State-run Mehr News Agency on Tuesday published a table on Iran’s 15 European oil customers and wrote that the country’s export of oil to this continent has hit a new record post-sanctions, reaching 700,000 barrels per day. NIOC Director for Int’l Affairs Mohsen Ghamsari has confirmed a daily export of 700k barrels of crude to Europe in an interview with the news agency. Ghamsari said Iran’s crude exports to the European countries [mostly] take place in the form of long-term spot contracts. Mehr News wrote that NIOC has also negotiated with some Russian companies such as ZarubezhNeft along with a number of companies in East Europe on one-year or spot-basis oil supplies.
Company Oil sale
French Total 160-200k pbd
Greek Hellenic Petroleum 60k bpd Italian Saras S.p.A 30-65k bpd
Russian Lukoil 80-110k bpd
Spanish CEPSA 35-60k bpd
Turkish Tüpraş 150k bpd
Italian Eni A 1-mm brl cargo1
Austrian OMW A 1-mm brl cargo
Polish LOTOS Two 1-mm brl cargos
Polish PKN Orlen A 1-mm brl cargo
Hungarian OML A 1-mm brl cargo
Royal Dutch Shell Two 1-mm brl cargos British Petroleum A 1-mm brl cargo
Swiss Vitol A 1-mm brl cargo
Spanish Repsol A 1-mm brl cargo Meanwhile, Reuters reported on Monday that Indonesia’s Pertamina will buy 1 million barrels of Iranian crude oil, which is expected to be delivered in the first quarter of 2017. According to its chief executive Dwi Soetjipto, this one
1 A one-million-barrel cargo
million barrel of oil is imported from Iran for
“experiment” and when the refinery knows the result, then it can negotiate for the long-term oil import deals.
The recent OPEC ordinary meeting held in late November in Vienna allowed Iran to increase its oil supplies by 90,000 bpd during the first six months of 2017, effective from Jan 1st.
Along with oil, Greece is also interested in receiving Iranian natural gas
In a separate development, an Iranian MOFA official confirmed a meeting between Greek Alternate Minister for Foreign Affairs George Katrougkalos and Iran’s Petroleum Minister’s Deputy for International Affairs Amir-Hossein Zamani-Nia and said Greece has shown interest in importing Iranian natural gas. According to ILNA, Hossein Esmaeili, the MOFA director general for Europe, America and Caspian Sea neighbors said that during their meeting which took place this week in Tehran, Zamani-Nia and Katrougkalos emphasized on their desire to develop energy cooperation. Along with
Zamani-Nia, Katrougkalos has met with Minister of Foreign Affairs Javad Zarif and his deputy Majid Takht-e-Ravanchi.
PMO to announce winners of Shahid- Rajaie Port tender soon
The managing director of Iranian Port & Marine Organization (PMO) said the call for tenders to develop the 1st and 2nd phases of the Port of Shahid-Rajaie (Bandar Abbas) has been completed and is under the pre-qualification stage for the 1st terminal. He said that four out of 28 bidders have been identified and that the
2 ultimate winner will be announced in the near
future based on the quality/price proposals.
Mohammad Saeed-Nejad said that for the 2nd terminal, the PMO is at the qualification
assessment stage to choose a bidder and added that the final two winners of the 1st and 2nd terminals of the Port of Shahid-Rajaie will be announced simultaneously.
PMO sees influx of interested investors post-sanctions but they should meet required conditions
Saeed-Nejad said the PMO witnesses the influx of foreign investors post-sanctions to engage in Iran’s port and marine projects and added that
“our condition for the entry of foreign investors is defining joint projects between the Iranian and foreign companies so as the Iranians be able to use the facilities and equipment provided by the foreign counterparts.” Saeed- Nejad cited transfer of knowledge and technology know-how as well as creation of added value as other conditions Iran has set for the entry of potential foreign investors.
In preliminary report, IMF estimates 6.6pc GDP growth rate for Iran in 2016
Less than a week after the CBI announced achieving an economic growth rate of 7.4%
during the first six months of the current Iranian year (spring and summer 2016), the IMF
released a “preliminary report” estimating an economic growth rate of 6.6 percent for the Iranian current Persian year (2016/17).
According to a statement published in the official website of the Fund, the preliminary findings were obtained during a visit that its staff team paid to the Islamic Republic from December 3-14. This report, which still needs to obtain the IMF management approval, states that higher oil output and exports helped the Iranian economy to rebound from recession in 2015-16, and hence, the economic growth rate
for 2016/17 and 2017/18 would be 6.6% and 3.5%, respectively. This report predicts an average inflation rate of 9% for 2016/17 and 11% for 2017/18. Full IMF report available here
Meanwhile, Iran’s Minister of Economic Affairs
& Finance Ali Tayyebnia said on Sunday that the country’s GDP growth in summer 2016
registered a 9% growth compared with summer 2015. The CBI and government’s announcement of 9% economic growth rate for summer and 7.4% for spring and summer 2016 has been questioned and challenged by the conservatives who believe that people don’t feel tangible results of such economic growth in their life.
Tasnim News Agency, an archconservative and constant critique of the Rouhani administration published an article on Monday titled “how the economic growth rate suddenly reached 9%?”
and argued that while all the Iranian economic activists are talking about an economic
downturn, it is unbelievable to assume a 9%
economic growth rate has been achieved.
Tasnim News has also quoted Gholamreza Mesbahi-Moghadam, a conservative cleric member of the parliament as saying that the announced 9.2% economic growth for summer is nothing but attempt to create “fake
happiness” and is a “misleading propaganda.”
Mohammad-Reza Pour-Ebrahim, head of the Majles Economy Commission says the six- month 7.4% GDP growth was oil-based, achieved due to the increase in oil production and exports, and hence, would not sustain in a long term. According to Mehr News, Pour- Ebrahimi said “our analysis about the 7.4% rate is that 70% of this figure relates to the boom in the oil sector, while the contribution of other economic sectors such as industry, service and agriculture is very insignificant.”
Iran signs MoU on sending workforce to Ireland
3 An official from the ministry of Labor,
Cooperative & Social Welfare said that a MoU in the hospitality sector has been reached with Ireland for sending Iranian labor to this country, ILNA reported on Monday. Mohammad Akbar- Nia, the ministry’s placement director said that in the past years, similar MoUs were signed with countries like Korea, Australia and Japan but due to the foreign policy problems, such cooperation didn’t realize. Akbar-Nia also referred to a MoU between Iran and Germany’s commerce chambers for sending Iranian
workforce and said the ministry welcomes such initiatives and is ready to provide job seekers with skill training services.
Of note, Akbar-Nia had said in April 2016 that the ministry is planning to send labor forces to the five countries of Turkey, Germany,
Australia, Denmark and Ireland. Two months earlier on February 19th, Hassan Karbasi, director of Iran’s International Employment Association had said that the government is going to send workforces to Germany, South Korea and Australia who are the world’s
“powerful economic poles.”
Iran TRANS Expo 2016
The first international Exhibition of Transport &
Logistic, Road Construction, Road Maintenance
& Related Industries (Dec 18-20) was inaugurated on Sunday in Tehran with participation of Minister of Road & Urban Development Abbas Akhundi and 115 companies. The exhibition was held on the
‘Transportation Week’ in Iran and aimed at helping development of Iran’s road building and maintenance industry post-sanctions. The exhibition was held by the ministry of Road &
Urban Development in cooperation with the World Road Association (PIARC). Participants in this event showcased their machineries in building road, bridge, tunnel as well as other
products such as loader, bulldozers, graders, snowplow machines and so on.
In a separate development, the 3rd seminar on Hospital Build & Facility Management was held in Tehran on December 18-19 with the
participation of Health minister’s deputies and ambassadors of about 10 Asian and European countries. Addressing the congress, Dr. Javad Haji-Mir-Esmaeil, Dean of the Iran University of Medical Science said that Iranian hospitals and medical centers are facing serious budgeting challenges and hence, the ministry of Health is determined to pursue plans to unitize non- governmental financial resources. “In this regard, using non-governmental capital is being pursued by the ministry of Health and formation of a consortium comprising financers and companies working in designing, building and launching hospitals has been put on the agenda,” he said.
Graph of the Day:
The upward movement of the US dollar price against the rial at the Iranian open (unofficial market) continues, with no sign of an imminent end...
20-Nov 22-Nov 24-Nov 26-Nov 28-Nov 30-Nov 2-Dec 4-Dec 6-Dec 8-Dec 10-Dec 12-Dec 14-Dec 16-Dec 18-Dec 20-Dec
One-month trend of US dollar/rial 20 Dec
39,800
11 Dec 39,000 1 Dec
38,300 21 Nov
36,880
