President Hassan Rouhani in an addressing to the parliament on August 20, said that drawing $100 billion in foreign investment to develop Iran\u2019s oil industry is among the oil minister\u2019s main tasks in his second term.<\/p>\n
There is bad news and good news,\u201d believes Chris Cook, a strategic market consultant, who also formerly headed the International Petroleum Exchange.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe bad news is that the Trump administration is intent on making Iranian access to dollars – whether dollar payments or dollar investment via equity funding or debt financing – to all intents and purposes impossible, notwithstanding anything in the JCPOA,\u201d Cook said responding to Trend query regarding the Islamic Republic\u2019s capability to draw foreign investment to renew the country\u2019s oil and gas industry.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe good news is that it is completely possible for trillions of dollars worth of investment to be made in Iran and in neighboring countries without using dollars at all. This is because accounting\/pricing – or keeping score – of transactions in dollars is very different from using the dollar clearing system to repay dollar debts or repatriate dollar profits on investment,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
Iran\u2019s Oil Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh has in recent years been engaged in updating the long-standing \u2018Energy Diplomacy\u2019, developed during the former president Mohammad Khatami\u2019s administration, Cook reminded, adding that this \u2018smart energy policy\u2019 instrument consisted of energy swaps, such as the Caspian oil swap (flows of Caspian crude oil into northern Iran, exchanged for flows of crude oil delivered out of the Persian Gulf).<\/p>\n
\u201cIn addition to reactivation of these and similar swaps, perhaps the most remarkable – and most important- \u2018Energy Diplomacy\u2019 was the recently contracted South Pars 11 investment by Total, through which 20 years\u2019 investment of technology, skills and experience will be swapped for a flow of condensate. The outcome is firstly a \u2018smart swap\u2019 of intellectual value for the value of carbon fuels, and secondly, through the participation of Chinese investors the deal provides 20 years\u2019 security of condensate demand for Iran and 20 years\u2019 security of condensate supply for China,\u201d Cook suggested.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe point is that such smart swaps will – within a suitable networked market platform or \u2018energy clearing union\u2019 – enable many hundred billion dollars worth of intellectual and other resources required by Iran to be swapped for many hundred billion dollars worth of carbon fuels supplied by Iran.<\/p>\n
\u201cSince such swaps do not take place on the oil market platform dominated by the US, they do not require settlement in dollars through the US dollar clearing system from which Iran is effectively excluded.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
President Hassan Rouhani in an addressing to the parliament on August 20, said that drawing $100 billion in foreign investment to develop Iran\u2019s oil industry is among the oil minister\u2019s main tasks in his second term. There is bad news and good news,\u201d believes Chris Cook, a strategic market consultant, who also formerly headed the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2],"tags":[645,28,454],"yoast_head":"\n