La bolsa de petroleo de Irán

Os envio esta nota de Reuters sobre la bolsa iraní de petróleo. Por su interés -y por la polémica que ha desatado el tema- creo que merece la pena. En resumen: Irán retrasa a 2007 la apertura de la bolsa. Solo cotizarán tres pequeños contratos de productos petroquímicos, no petróleo. Y califica de "propaganda" el cambio a euros. Será en dólares.

A continuación, el texto de la noticia (en inglés): Iran sees pilot oil bourse open before March 2007

TEHRAN, April 4 (Reuters) - Iran plans to open an oil bourse on the Gulf island of Kish before March 2007 but it will be a small pilot operation trading only two or three petrochemical products, the project's head said on Tuesday.

Iran has previously announced it would start an oil bourse in the year to March 2005 and in the year to March 2006.

But Mohammad Javad Asemipour, adviser to Iran's oil minister and head of the bourse project, said everything was finally set for an opening before March 2007.

He said Iran's bourse council, which includes the finance minister and central bank governor, was now examining the legal and technical aspects of the project.

"In one or two months we can get approval," Asemipour told Reuters.

"The hall is ready in Kish. There is an agreement between us and the stockmarket there, and they are going to sell their hall to us," he added.

"We are going to start off with two or three petrochemical by-products and through the first year will carry out exercises to find problems and to test software and hardware."

Western media and think-tanks have speculated that Iran's oil bourse would this year undermine the importance of the dollar by pricing the world's fourth biggest exports of crude in euros.

Asemipour dismissed such suggestions as "propaganda" and also rejected reports that his bourse was intended to rival exchanges being set up in Dubai and Qatar.

"We are looking for co-operation, not competition'" he said.

He said switching to crude sales would have to be phased in gradually and was dependent on the success of the petrochemicals trading.

"We are not in a hurry," he said. "It all depends on the system itself, then we can expand to swaps with northern countries, then crude oil - starting with low quality oil," he said, without specifying a timeframe for this expansion.

He also said Iran had no plans to set prices in euros.

"We are not going to dictate the currencies. The players in the market will be the base for this," he said.

Asemipour stressed the Iranian bourse was not meant to challenge the IPE and NYMEX exchanges, but was simply intended to increase liquidity in Gulf energy trading.

He dismissed suggestions that fears about economic sanctions or an attack on Iran, over the country's disputed nuclear programme, would scare away foreign money.

"We are going to have foreign brokers who can bring more liquidity," he said.