{"id":20217,"date":"2018-10-29T05:24:52","date_gmt":"2018-10-29T05:24:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=20217"},"modified":"2018-10-29T05:24:52","modified_gmt":"2018-10-29T05:24:52","slug":"million-barrel-oil-sale-by-iran-ends-in-failure","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=20217","title":{"rendered":"Million-barrel oil sale by Iran ends in failure"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

\nJEDDAH: An attempt by Iran on Sunday to counter new US sanctions on its crucial oil trade ended in failure.<\/p>\n

\nTehran offered a million barrels of oil to private buyers on IRENEX, the Iranian energy index, at an initial base price of $79.16 per barrel.<\/p>\n

\nThe offer attracted limited bids of $16 below the base price as trading began. A final buyer emerged after the price was dropped to $74.85 per barrel in the closing hours \u2014 and for only 280,000 of the million barrels on offer.<\/p>\n

\nIran refused to disclose the identity of the buyer, and said only that a conglomerate of private companies had made the purchase through three brokerages.<\/p>\n

\nThe sales flop is a blow to Iran\u2019s hopes of circumventing renewed US oil sanctions, which begin on Nov. 4. They follow US President Donald Trump\u2019s withdrawal in May from the 2015 agreement to curb Iran\u2019s nuclear program.<\/p>\n

\nThe plan to sell oil on the energy exchange once a week was proposed in July by vice president Eshaq Jahangiri to \u201cdefeat America\u2019s efforts … to stop Iran\u2019s oil exports.\u201d Tehran hopes selling to private buyers will make it harder for the US to monitor and stop its sales.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cWith the imminent return of a new wave of sanctions, the government is determined to utilize the maneuvering ability of the private sector to sell Iran\u2019s oil and find new markets,\u201d said Hamidreza Salehi, director of Iran\u2019s energy exports federation.<\/p>\n

\nIran\u2019s oil exports are estimated to have dropped by a third since May.<\/p>\n

\n\u00a0<\/p>\n

\nUtopian future<\/strong><\/p>\n

\nMeanwhile, a plan unveiled by supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei for Iran to be a world leader in science, technology and innovation by 2065 has been greeted with widespread ridicule.<\/p>\n

\nThe plan promises the elimination of poverty and corruption, with the Iranian economy among the world\u2019s top 10. \u201cThe environment, natural resources, clean water, energy, and food safety will be no problem anywhere in the country and everyone will equally benefit from these resources. New resources will be discovered, and a surplus of opportunities will be created that leaves no one empty handed,\u201d the plan says.<\/p>\n

\nKhamenei \u201cwent public with the plan when the country is in the throes of a severe economic, social, political and environmental crisis \u2014 a situation many regard as being so dire that it is an extreme challenge to even predict what the next year will look like,\u201d Ali Ranjipour, an analyst with the BBC Persian service, told the US-based Iran News Wire.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\u201cThis is a utopian future with no link to reality, a fantasy scenario bolstered by nostalgia.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nThe Iranian-American Harvard scholar Dr. Majid Rafizadeh told Arab News: “This is not the first time Iranian leaders have used such rhetoric and made promises that cannot be fulfilled.<\/p>\n

\n“Khamenei failed to address the underlying reasons behind Iran’s poor economy, which include political and financial corruption at the top, support for foreign militia groups, mismanagement of public funds, and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ military adventurism across the region.<\/p>\n

\n“As long as these factors exist, Iran’s economy will continue to deteriorate and ordinary people will suffer. The regime is facing significant pressure from the public due to the misalignment between the fortunes of the Iranian regime and the ordinary population.<\/p>\n

\n“Khamenei is attempting to appeal to the public through collections of words rather than actions. \u00a0His plan is doomed to fail because the regime’s economic problems are systemic and deeply embedded within the theocratic establishment.”\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

JEDDAH: An attempt by Iran on Sunday to counter new US sanctions on its crucial oil trade ended in failure. Tehran offered a million barrels of oil to private buyers on IRENEX, the Iranian energy index, at an initial base price of $79.16 per barrel. The offer attracted limited bids of $16 below the base…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":20218,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20217","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-middle_east_news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20217","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=20217"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20217\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/20218"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=20217"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=20217"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=20217"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}