Doing Away with the USD

OPEC considers dumping US dollar
Fri, 15 Feb 2008 16:55:38
Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries plans to discuss a proposal by Iran and Venezuela to price oil in non-dollar currencies.

Finance minister of the group, which supplies 40 percent of the global crude demand, will meet to study the proposal, the organization's President Chakib Khelil said.

Khalil, however, did not say when the ministers are scheduled to discuss the proposal amid the ongoing depreciation of the dollar.

The idea floated by Tehran and Caracas since the dwindling dollar fallen 16.2 percent against a basket of major currencies since two years ago.

Iran, the OPEC's second largest exporter, has already cut all of its ties with the greenback with respect to oil transactions.

Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim Al Thani had also said earlier that amid concerns about the weakness of the US dollar in recent months, the oil-rich Persian Gulf littoral state would shift Qatari riyal from the US currency over the next six months.

"The dollar lost a lot of value and energy worldwide is priced in the dollar, so all the producers are affected by the development on the dollar. This is a cycle so we have to live with it," Abdullah Bin Hamad Al-Attiyah said.

The UAE is also likely to follow the lead, as Kuwait did last May.

MK/MMN

Iran Oil Bourse may use Russian ruble Fri, 15 Feb 2008 22:20:26

The Russian national currency, ruble, is an option for dealings at the Iran Oil Bourse, set to be launched soon, an Iranian official says. "We are seeking to launch an oil exchange in Iran selling the crude in currencies other than US dollar. It is possible that in the future, we'll be able to use the ruble, Russia's national currency, in our operations," the Iranian Ambassador to Moscow Gholam-Reza Ansari noted. "Russia and Iran, two major producers of the world's energy, should encourage oil and gas transactions in various non-dollar currencies, releasing the world from being a slave of dollar," he added. The world's fourth-largest oil producer is to open its long-awaited oil exchange this weekend. The Oil Bourse is supposed to trade oil products in non-dollar currencies and many analysts believe that it could be a blow to the already declining greenback. Russia's first deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev also said on Friday, that Moscow should take advantage of the rising weakness of the greenback to make the ruble a regional reserve currency. "Today the global economy is going through uneasy times. The role of the key reserve currencies is under review. And we must take advantage of it," Medvedev said in Siberian city of Krasnoyarsk. "The ruble will de facto become one of the regional reserve currencies." MK/MMN