Page 4 - IRANRptMar21
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1.0 Executive summary
Iran has endured three years of recession under the renewed US sanctions. The first of those sanctions kicked in halfway through 2018, a year that brought a GDP contraction of 6%. Things worsened in 2019 as the sanctions screw was tightened, with economic output falling 6.8%. The World Bank estimates that GDP declined by 3.7% in 2020.
Iranian health authorities have issued a warning on March 1 over a "fourth wave" of the coronavirus (COVID-19) epidemic, after registering more than 100 deaths in 24 hours, Otagh Online reported. The new daily figure takes the Iranian death toll from the epidemic to 60,181. The country crossed the 60,000 barrier earlier in February.
New US President Joe Biden has reiterated that his administration will lift sanctions on Iran if Tehran returns to “strict compliance with the nuclear deal”. The new US administration’s continuation of the so-called maximum pressure campaign previously installed by the Trump government has not been taken well in Iran, which was hoping for a change in tune from Washington. Despite warm gestures after taking office in January, Biden has not budged on Iran, saying that it should re-enter the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) before the US will consider lifting sanctions. Tehran, meanwhile, said it is Washington, which left the deal in 2018 under Trump’s direction, which is at fault. Tehran on February 28 ruled out closed-door meetings with Washington and other major powers to break the log jam currently.
A month before November’s US election, Iran’s rial hit the 300,000-to-the-dollar threshold for the first time ever on the unregulated free market in Tehran as tensions with the Trump administration tightened and a coronavirus third wave took its toll on the economy. That put the rial 46% down against the dollar since the start of 2020. The currency has since recovered to around 240,000, but remains volatile. During the course of the four-year Trump presidency, the rial lost 80% against the greenback.
On January 20, Iran’s deputy minister of economic affairs and finance said the country’s foreign debt was currently very insignificant at nearly zero. Utilising foreign debt could be a good opportunity for the government to meet investment needs inside Iran, Mohammad-Ali Dehqan Dehnavi added.
Last October also brought an IMF forecast that Iran's total budget deficit for the current fiscal year (ending on March 19) will be around $58bn. In an April report, the IMF predicted that Iran's foreign exchange reserves would be $85bn in 2020, but around 90% of the reserves are frozen abroad by sanctions.
In mid-January, the head of the Tehran Stock Exchange (TSE) and the Securities and Exchange Organisation of Iran (SEO) resigned from both of his posts in the wake of a “Black Monday” market crash. Hassan Ghalibaf Asl went as angry protests grew outside the exchange building, trading was halted and the TSE website was pulled.
4 IRAN Country Report March 2021 www.intellinews.com
