There are reports that Iran is offering barter deals — gold bullion for grain, and oil for rice and bananas. Reuters reports that last week, for the first time anyone can remember, an Iranian supertanker loaded with crude, the Delvar, anchored at Karimun Island in the Singapore Strait. Reuters explains that Karimun “is a key offshore storage point near Asia’s biggest oil trading hub, Singapore, and is often used for ship-to-ship transfers.”
That underscores the likelihood that with dwindling access to the global financial system, and an EU oil embargo looming, Iran will turn oil into its currency. And it will try to get around sanctions by turning its oil tankers — which are not currently sanctioned — into de facto floating bank accounts, for a regime which has long treated terror networks and munitions as a higher priority than putting bananas and rice on the table. Full story
