Baku, Azerbaijan, April 17
By Farhad Daneshvar – Trend:
Iran’s national currency, the rial, recently hit an all-time low, and economic uncertainty looks likely to even worsen the situation.
“In addition to the plans on bartering oil for goods between Iran and regional partners, such as Russia, India and China, the continuation of the illegal transaction of money through the security and religious bodies would limit Tehran’s access to US dollar and euro,” Mehrdad Emadi, an economic expert and consultant at the UK-based Betamatrix International Consultancy told Trend.
Iran’s currency, the rial, traded at 40,000 to the dollar last year, recently plunged to 60,000 rials per dollar on the open market rates. The government, in order to confront with the weakening national currency, announced a plan to implement a currency peg at 42,000 rials.
Russia and Iran have been working on oil-for-goods deals worth up to $20 billion, but several dates on beginning the arrangement have been pushed back.
“Limiting the country’s access to foreign currencies would contribute to the plunging value of the rial, which may drop to 75,000 rials,” Emadi added.
Central Bank of Iran has also imposed a ban on the sale of foreign currencies at exchange shops, under which the exchangers no longer have the right to buy, sell, or transfer foreign currencies.
“The figure was arrived at calibrating the latest data to a mathematical model built for the Iranian economy,” Emadi believes so.