RoydadNaft –  The CEO of the Iran Energy Exchange said the market has the capacity to expand crude exports and that offering Iran’s export oil on the exchange could diversify sales methods, ease some of the problems in selling and settling oil deals, and help finance upstream oil and gas development.

According to Roydad Naft, Mohammad Nazifi pointed to the exchange’s role in developing exports of one of Iran’s most strategic products. He said one of the original reasons for creating an energy exchange in a country with large oil and gas resources was to put that market capacity to greater use.

A substantial share of physical energy trades on the Iran Energy Exchange already have an international character and are destined for export, he said. On that basis, Iran’s export crude can also be traded through the same markets.

Ready to host export oil trades

Nazifi said that if a platform is created on the exchange for physical crude trading, sales, and delivery, related financial instruments can also be listed there. That, he said, could provide significant support for financing upstream oil and gas development in Iran.

Listing crude would diversify Iran’s oil sales

He said bringing oil onto the Energy Exchange would have effects in the physical market as well as in finance. Offering crude on the exchange could diversify the ways Iran sells its oil.

Pointing to existing problems in oil sales and settlement, including the maritime blockade, Nazifi said Iran faces multiple challenges in selling crude and in settling completed transactions.

The Energy Exchange, he said, can resolve part of those challenges through different and more varied methods. For that reason, the exchange has always been ready to host oil trades.

Nazifi said he hoped the same will would take shape at the Oil Ministry so that crude trading on Iran’s Energy Exchange can begin.