Wednesday February 22, 2012

I've Been Thinking:

China and India have announced that they will be cutting their crude oil imports from Iran by 10%.

Together China and India total 35%- 45% of Iran's oil export so a reduction of 10% each would be a significant drop in oil revenues. A reduction of that size could really hurt Iran.

But ... Iran exports between 2.1 - 2.14 million barrels of oil per day, depending on the seasonal demand.

Earlier in February China reduced their Iranian oil imports and India grabbed the excess to meet the exact amount of China's reduction. Meanwhile, South Africa doubled its oil imports from Iran to 100,000 barrels per day.

This all means that even as pressure to squeeze Iran increases in the West, Iranian oil exports remain largely unchanged. Iran finds other willing importers.

The only chance of effectively pressuring Iran is to get China and India to follow through and reduce their oil imports by even more than the 10% they have announced. The way to truly hurt Iran is to have China and India break, or at least drastically reduce their ties with Iran.

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