TEHRAN – National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC)’s representative in Iran Energy Exchange (IRENEX) said that the company will continue offering oil at IRENEX after a few week of hiatus due to technical problems.

“The process of offering crude oil and gas condensate will be ongoing on a regular basis, and the recent interval has been due solely to customizing and updating the process to match the market conditions and future offerings will be announced soon,” Amir-Hossein Tebyanian told Shana on Wednesday.

The official noted that since offering oil and gas condensate in the stock exchange is naturally affected by market conditions and “we should therefore not have unrealistic expectations regarding the oil sales through this platform.”

The national budget law for the current Iranian calendar year (started on March 21) obliges the Oil Ministry to offer at least two million barrels of light crude oil, two million barrels of heavy crude oil and two million barrels of gas condensate at the international ring of Iran Energy Exchange (IRENEX) every month. However, the process has been facing a break in the past few weeks.

Offering crude oil and gas condensate at IRENEX is to materialize the objectives of “Resistance Economy” for diversifying methods of selling these products and benefitting from the capabilities of private sector for exporting them.

National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) offered light crude oil at IRENEX first on October 28, 2018, just few days before new U.S. sanctions on Iran’s petroleum sector took effect (November 4).

Offering gas condensate at IRENEX came after the successful offering of crude oil at this market. And then the turn came to heavy crude. Offering heavy crude at IRENEX came after NIOC offered light crude at this stock market in eight round. 

Now, after nearly one year, the released reports show that sales of these products has not been so successful and welcomed, as according to the representative of NIOC at IRENEX, just about one million barrels of light crude and 70,000 barrels of heavy crude have been sold at IRENEX since the second Iranian calendar month of Ordibehesht (began on April 21), although the products have been regularly offered at IRENEX on a weekly basis.

IRENEX Managing Director Seyed Ali Hosseini believes that policymaking and execution are not integrated; and it is the reason behind the slow trend of the trades in IRENEX.

EF/