Baku, Azerbaijan, June 25
Trend:
Tehran's Grand Bazaar traders brought down the shutters in protest at stagnation and unprecedented currency (rial) collapse.
According to Iran’s media reports the traders held “peaceful” protests on June 25 and chanted slogans in Tehran Bazaar.
The protestors called the government to take efficient measures against the growing economic turmoil.
A day before, merchants at the Aladdin and Charsou mobile phone shopping centers in central Tehran protested against the rapid depreciation of the rial by closing down their shops.
Amid the protests, the Iranian administration announced that will create a parallel market next week in a bid to combat the black market and facilitate the trade of foreign currencies in the country.
The decision came after the Iranian rial plunged to a record low against the US dollar on the unofficial market on June 24, continuing its slide amid fears of returning US sanctions after President Donald Trump in May withdrew from a deal on Tehran’s nuclear program.
The US dollar was being offered for as much as 87,000 rials, compared to around 75,500 on Thursday, the last trading day before Iran’s weekend, according to foreign exchange websites, which track the unofficial market.
The fall of the national currency has provoked a public outcry over the quick rise of prices of imported consumer goods.
In an effort to halt the slide, Iranian authorities announced in April they were unifying the dollar’s official and black market exchange rates at a single level of 42,000, and banning any trade at other rates under the threat of arrest.
