Oil Trading
A rumour that has been doing the rounds for some time is that one of the main reasons that the US went to war in Iraq is because Saddam threatened to start trading oil in Euros. While this has not been substantiated as far as I know it is certainly more plausible than any reasons that the administration has given to date.
The Bush administration has been paying a lot more attention to Iran recently. Part of that interest is clearly Iran’s nuclear program — but there may be more to the story. One bit of news that hasn’t received the public vetting it merits is Iran’s declared intent to open an international oil exchange market, or “bourse.” Not only would the new entity compete against the New York Mercantile Exchange and London’s International Petroleum Exchange (both owned by American corporations), but it would also ignite international oil trading in euros.
“A shift away from US dollars to euros in the oil market would cause the demand for petrodollars to drop, perhaps causing the value of the dollar to plummet,” Brian Miller and Celeste Vogler of Project Censored wrote in Censored 2006.
“Russia, Venezuela and some members of OPEC have expressed interest in moving towards a petroeuro system,” he said. And it isn’t entirely implausible that China, which is “the world’s second largest holder of US currency reserves,” might eventually follow suit.
Although China, as a major exporter of goods to the United States, has a vested interest in helping shore up the American economy and has even linked its own currency, the yuan, to the dollar, it has also become increasingly dependent on Iranian oil and gas.
“Barring a US attack, it appears imminent that Iran’s euro-dominated oil bourse will open in March, 2006,” Miller and Vogler continued. “Logically, the most appropriate US strategy is compromise with the EU and OPEC towards a dual-currency system for international oil trades.”
But you won’t hear any discussion of that alternative on the six o’clock news.
I do not understand why no mainstream media outlet has at least examined this issue. Even if they were to dismiss it as an unrealistic pipedream, why not at least discuss it? Strange days.
Indeed the lack of attention in the mainstream media is certainly suspicious but seems to be a sign of the times. There is an article in The Guardian on the subject I have found and naturally Al Jazeera have something to say about it. The Prudent Investor Blog is worth a read too however my searches on the BBC rather unsurprisingly revealed nothing.
Over the last five years I have noticed unprecedented manacling of the press added to the fact that there has been a substantial rise in the Western World of the Media Baron businesses who convert their acquisitions into agenda driven enterprises rather than news services, but that’s the subject of another article…
currency trading training…
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