The end of the petrodollar is the end of the dollar hegemony. And the end of the dollar hegemony is the end of the United States of America as a superpower, if not worst than that.
The Tehran Times, a central media outlet of the world’s fourth-largest oil exporter, said that Iran has started substituting euros for dollars in oil sales. The minister of economy, Davoud Danesh-Ja’fari, announced that Iran wants to cut its dollar-based transactions to a minimum.
Bloomberg News reports: "Iran's oil export contracts for months have included a clause that allows the nation to seek payment in the euro and other currencies, creating a mechanism for a switch should Iran's policy change, according to traders who buy Iranian oil".
It was expected: Iran seems like it is defending itself from Iraq's diabolic fate generated by the same US which declares it to be next.
Accordingly, Iran, as an act of self defense, signals straight to Washington it can hurt harder.
And it can indeed: by shifting the most valuable commodity on earth nowadays, oil and gas, from a dollar tied commodity (hence “the petrodollar”, trading oil in US dollars) to a euro tied commodity (hence “the petroeuro”) it can collapse, surprisingly easily, the already fragile dollar hegemony. Due to the fact that others will follow.
Other economies around the world will join Iran out of their own substantial reasons. like Iran, they have their own motivation and necessity to get loose from United States’ violent grip. Venezuela, another important OPEC member is one, Russia another, and others. Add it to the just announced
new Chinese oil wholesale market plus the upcoming
Iranian oil bourse plus the efforts of major central banks to get rid of their dollars while the collapse of the petrodollar looming and the reason for Washington’s panic is getting much clearer.
Iran still leaves an open door for diplomacy, it is sending the message “I can do this already”, but on the other hand “I didn’t start operating the whole transition yet”. It looks as if the
Iraq Study Group that showed up suddenly to recommend a diplomatic channel with Iran was formed only to enable Washington to climb down the tall tree it is on.
When asked for an official statement regarding Iran's energy trade policy, by US Bloomberg news, Hojatollah Ghanimifard, executive director for international affairs at National Iranian Oil Co., played the game of the official lines and replied that Iran’s policy of selling oil in US dollars ‘‘has not changed yet’’.
