Page 18 - IRANRptJun18

While Iran’s gold coin and bar demand more than tripled in the first quarter, Saudi Arabia’s declined 15% y/y, making the Iranians once more the biggest gold buyers in the Middle East.
According to the IMF in its Regional Economic Outlook on May 4, the value of Iran’s gross official reserves will reach $108.4bn in 2018. The country’s gross official reserves will experience a $13.3bn jump in the current year rising from last year’s $95.1bn.
5.2 FTAs
EEU, Iran sign interim free trade agreement in Astana
The Moscow-led Eurasian Economic Union (EEU) and Iran have signed an interim free trade agreement (FTA), TASS reported on May 17. “The provisional agreement includes an initial list of goods, the import duties on which will be reduced or zeroed in mutual trade after the agreement comes into force. The agreement covers half of mutual trade," chairman of the Board of the Eurasian Economic Commission Tigran Sargsyan reportedly said at an economic forum held in Astana, Kazakhstan.
Since it was founded in 1979, the Islamic Republic of Iran has never managed to conclude an FTA with another country or economic bloc. In recent months, Tehran has repeatedly pushed Moscow to enable the sealing of the EEU deal. Iran sees access to Russia and the EEU as a major step to expanding its trading area to the north.
Trade between the EEU—the members of which are Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Armenia and Belarus—and Iran reached $2.7bn last year. The FTA list of goods for EEU countries includes meat and fat-and-oil products, certain types of confectionery, cosmetics and electronic and mechanical equipment. Iran on the other hand will enjoy tariff preferences on items including vegetables, fruits, dried fruits and building materials.
Several Iranian fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) now present their information in Russian in addition to Persian, Arabic and English. They include items such as Iranian-made potato crisps and ice cream products.
"Average import duties on industrial goods will go down by seven percentage points for Iran, and by 3.5 points for the EEU member states. Import duties on farm products will go down by 19 percentage points for Iran and by five points for the EAEU," Sargsyan added. Reportedly, a full agreement between the EEU and Iran may be signed in three years.
5.3 FDI
Iran FDI 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016
FDI net inflows (BoP) (USD bn)
3.649 4.277 4.662 3.05 2.105 2.05 3.37
FDI net inflows (% of GDP)
0.749 0.733 0.778 0.653 0.485 0.531 0.805
FDI net outflows (% of GDP)
0.049 0.044 0.226 0.04 0.001 0.031 0.025
source: World Bank
18 IRAN Country Report June 2018 www.intellinews.com