Iran evading oil sanctions

Despite the U.S. imposing sanctions on Iran in November, OPEC’s third-largest producer has been exporting much more oil than widely reported, according to the Economist Intelligence Unit

Iran’s oil exports (million barrels per day – mb/d)

May: President Trump withdraws from Iran nuclear deal – sanctions reimposed from November

Aug-Nov: Iran’s tactics to conceal export volumes include turning off ship transponders to hide destinations and performing multiple ship-to-ship transfers mid-journey

3.0
2.5
2.0
1.5
1.0
0.5
0.0 
    Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov

2.12 2.51 2.54 2.82 2.72 2.57 2.39 1.98 1.72 1.50 1.00

EIU estimates exports at 2 mb/d

Nov 4: 180-day waiver limits imports to 1.5 mb/d

China 0.36
India 0.30
South Korea 0.13
Japan, Italy, Greece, Taiwan, Turkey 0.71
             

Source: Economist Intelligence Unit-CargoMetrics report © GRAPHIC NEWS