EconomicsEconomics
Sept 6 - Banks in the UAE have been directed by the central bank to provide more frequent details of remittances to Iran, bankers said on Monday, in an apparent tightening of scrutiny in line with UN sanctions.
The UAE, a US ally with a large expat Iranian population in the emirate of Dubai, has been under pressure to crack down on sanctions-busting links with Iran.
Sep 6 - Iran's central bank says the country's inflation rate has declined to 8.8 percent in August.
The Central Bank of Iran, in figures posted Monday on its Web site, said inflation in July was at 9.1 percent.
It predicted that the inflation rate will drop further in September.
The central bank did not provide any explanation for the decline. Iran had suffered from double-digit inflation rates for years, but the figure has dropped below 10 percent since May.
A number of cost-cutting measures, largely focused on curbing subsidies, are planned.
But analysts worry that such moves could propel inflation significantly higher as key commodities are effected. Many experts believe that inflation is still above 20 percent, despite the government's figures./-
Sept 5 - Most banks in the United Arab Emirates, an important trading partner for Iran, have stopped money transfers there after the latest round of sanctions on the Islamic republic, bankers said on Sunday.
"We stopped transfers to Iran in all currencies in July," an executive from an international bank, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told AFP. A banker with an Emirati bank said that transfers to Iran in dollars and euros are now forbidden, and have become "very difficult, if not impossible, in dirhams," the UAE's currency.
Sep 4 – Iranian Majlis speaker dismissed the opening of the country’s economy aiming to join WTO, ISNA reported Saturday.
Ali Larijani talking at a gathering of political activists in the central city of Qom said many countries pay subsidy to their products to support their export, thus we have to make a hike in export volume possible as well. He added Iran has to develop its economy and culture upon its own model but did not elaborate on the subject.
Sep 4 - Business Monitor has predicted an economic growth of 2.1% for 2010, reported Donyaye-Eghtessad daily on Saturday.
The figure for 2009 was 1% only, BM claims. The same source forecasts an average of 3% growth for the Iranian economy for the next five years.
The World Bank’s forecast for 2010 is 3% and IMF predicts almost the same economic growth for Iran in the current year says the report./-
Sep 3 - Japan said it is suspending new oil and gas investments in Iran and freezing the assets of 88 organizations and 24 individuals in its latest round of sanctions for the Middle Eastern country’s nuclear program, Bloomberg reported from Tokyo Friday.
“We’ve decided to add more sanctions to prevent nuclear proliferation and development,” Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshito Sengoku told reporters today in Tokyo.
Aug 30 – The competition between Iran and Turkmenistan over export of natural gas to Pakistan and India has entered in a new phase, reported Fars news agency Monday.
Fars says that Turkmenistan president has asked his oil minister Nadirov to undersign the agreement between Turkmenistan, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India for the construction of the so called TAPI project.
The Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdimuhammadov and the Afghan President Hamid Karzai will meet in New York (USA) in September, to discuss the gas pipeline project, the Turkmen Government said.
Aug 30 - The Tehran Stock Exchange has hit a record high, shooting up nearly 4 percent in two days.
The benchmark index rose to more than 17900 on Monday, pushing the exchange's total value to more than $80 billion, up from $70 billion in mid-July.
The months-long rise is being driven by trading by state-run firms, increased liquidity and the government's push to privatize a number of public sector firms by next year, according to analysts.
Iranian officials are looking to privatize more than 500 state firms to generate some $12 billion./-
Aug 29 – The number of workers dismissed from their jobs has doubled in the period between March and June 2010 comparing to the same period a year ago, reported Mehr news agency on Saturday.
The semiofficial news agency reports the difference between the official and nonofficial statistics over the number of jobless in Iran is about 1.5 million people.
Mehr claims that there are no exact statistics over the outcome of the so-called Quick Yielding Companies available and according to the official statistics 3.5 million or 14.5% Iranians were jobless in the spring time of the current year.
