Iran says gold trade with Turkey to resume

 Reuters

* Gold trade seen less than last year
* Trade boomed in 2012 as Iranians bought gold
* More Turkish banks seen working with Iran (Adds quotes, Halkbank, background)

Gold trade between Turkey and Iran will resume, albeit at lower levels than last year, once sanctions on Iran are eased, Iran's ambassador to Turkey said on Friday.

Turkey's gold trade with Iran boomed in 2012 when Ankara was paying for its natural gas and oil imports with Turkish lira and Iranians were using those deposits held in Turkey's Halkbank to buy gold.

"Certainly the gold trade between Iran and Turkey will resume," the ambassador, Ali Reza Bigdeli, told reporters in the Turkish capital on Friday.

"Due to the problems in money transfers in 2012, the gold trade rose. I don't think that we are still in the same situation that would require us to trade in gold in those amounts," he said.

Some of the gold was held inside Turkey in the peak of the trade, while some was taken to Dubai by couriers to be sold for foreign currency which was much needed by Iran and to which it did not have access due to tight Western sanctions.

This trade had dried up as a provision of U.S. sanctions, made law in the summer of 2012 and implemented from Feb. 6, effectively tightened control on sales of precious metals to Iran and prevented Halkbank from processing oil payments by other countries back to Tehran.

"There are a lot of areas between Iran and Turkey that we could trade, we should revive those too," Bigdeli said.

He also said Halkbank will maintain an important role in relations between Ankara and Tehran and that other Turkish banks are expected to work with Iran as risks ease.

Source:  http://mobile.reuters.com/article/idUSL5N0JE1OR20131129?irpc=932

Turkey would struggle to cut Iran oil imports further: official

 Reuters

Turkey would struggle to cut its crude oil imports from Iran any further, a Turkish official said on Thursday, after the U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill to tighten sanctions on the Islamic Republic by further slashing its oil exports.

"Turkey has already cut the amount of oil it buys from Iran as much as possible. A further cut after this would greatly stretch Turkey," the official said.

Turkey's sole refiner Tupras has cut Iranian oil imports by around 40 percent to 110,000 barrels per day (bpd) and raised purchases from Saudi Arabia, Libya and Iraq.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/08/01/usa-iran-sanctions-idUSL1N0G12L320130801

Iran Beyond Oil?

Patrick Clawson*      The Washington Institute 

The image of Iran's economy as oil, carpets, and pistachios was always flawed, but has now become badly dated. The Islamic Republic is in the midst of a non-oil export boom -- it has the potential to remain a middle-income country even with no oil exports, and the reserves to finance the transition in the meantime. 

For years, Iran's leaders called for reduced reliance on oil but did little to meet that goal. Western sanctions have seemingly spurred them to action -- in his annual Nowruz address on March 21, Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei acknowledged for the first time that restrictions on the country's oil exports had made a serious impact: "The sanctions have had an effect, which is because of an essential flaw that we are suffering from. The flaw that our economy is suffering from is that it is dependent on oil." He also acknowledged that Iran's "economic weakness" had led to "harsh conditions for certain groups of people." Rather than change Iranian nuclear policy, however, he argued, "We can turn every threat into an opportunity...The sanctions caused the massive domestic capacities of the Iranian nation to become activated."

TRADE BECOMING MORE BALANCED

While still important, oil is becoming a smaller part of Iran's trade. In 2012, the country imported $57 billion in goods and exported $34 billion in non-oil products, meaning that non-oil exports covered 60% of the import bill, compared to 24% in 2002 and 14% in 1992. It produced this shift in part by converting more of its oil into industrial products for export; according to the Iranian Customs Administration, the $29.2 billion in non-oil exports over the first eleven months of fiscal 2012/2013 included $9.0 billion in chemical products (mostly petrochemicals such as urea fertilizer and polyethylene) and $3.2 billion in plastics made from oil. But other products are also being exported at high rates, including $8.2 billion in minerals, stone, cement, and related products, $5.3 billion in agricultural products, and $800 million in carpets. The country's largest market is Iraq, which took $5.6 billion in goods over the same period, including much of Iran's manufactured exports (e.g., more than $300 million in automobiles). The next-largest customers were China ($4.8 billion), the United Arab Emirates ($3.9 billion), Afghanistan ($2.5 billion), India ($2.4 billion), and Turkey ($1.3 billion).

Iranian oil minister to meet with Turkish energy minister to discuss oil and gas trade.

REUTERS

Iran is expected to try to revive demand for its oil in Turkey, its biggest European customer, this week when, according to Turkish energy ministry officials, its oil minister is to meet with Turkish officials in Ankara.

Iranian oil minister Rostam Qasemi is expected to meet Turkish Energy Minister Taner Yildiz on Thursday to discuss supplying oil and gas to one of Europe's fastest growing economies, the officials said.

Tehran has struggled to find new buyers for its barrels after U.S. and European Union sanctions succeeded in halving Iran's global oil exports in the four months from February to June.

Non-EU Turkey, which imported around 200,000 barrels a day of Iranian crude in 2011, also sharply reduced shipments earlier this year to win a waiver from U.S. sanctions that allows it to continue purchasing Iranian crude through the second half of 2012.