Iran gains $5 bln by currency shift to euro

Posted by Philip Dru on 11/24/09 • Categorized as Economy, Iran, U.S. Dollar

TEHRAN, Nov. 23 (Xinhua) — Iran’s Central Bank governor Mahmoud Bahmani said on Monday that the country has gained 5 billion U.S. dollars by shifting its foreign currency reserve from the U.S. dollar to the euro, local satellite Press TV reported.

“We have seen a 5 billion U.S. dollars benefit from shifting the (currency) basket to the euro from the dollar,” Bahmani was quoted as saying.

However, the report did not elaborate the span of time during which the country has netted the gain.

“Iran has considerably reduced the total of U.S. dollars in its currency basket,” he said.

Since October 2007, Iran received 85 percent of its oil revenues in currencies other than the U.S. dollar, according to the report.

The switch was proposed by Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in 2005 as a counter-measure to the U.S. and Western moves against Iran’s controversial nuclear program.

In September, Ahmadinejad ordered the euro to be used instead of the dollar as Iran’s “basic foreign currency.”

China View | Monday, November 23, 2009

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