Export firms sold $1.1 billion of their overseas income at the secondary foreign exchange platform (known locally as Nima) from the beginning of the fiscal year (March 21) until Thursday (April 28).
The amount was almost 90% higher on the corresponding period last year, the Central Bank of Iran reported.
Nima is an online platform affiliated to the CBI through which exporters sell their overseas currency and companies buy to import goods, machinery, equipment and raw materials.
In this system, importers announce their forex needs, exporters register their currency proceeds and banks and authorized moneychangers act as brokers.
As per existing data, the majority of export income is returned by a limited number of big companies, namely in the petrochemical sector.
Ahmad Mahdavi, secretary of the Petrochemical Industry Contractors Guild Association, on Thursday said the key industry has performed well with regard to forex income repatriation.
In a talk with IRNA, Mahdavi said the industry generated $14.5 billion in foreign currency last year, 86% of which was sold via Nima.
“An estimated $12.5 billion from petrochemical export was sold at Nima to [help] meet the country’s need for currency,” he was quoted as saying.
“The rest of the revenue was used inside the industry to finance development projects, buy raw material and boost capital.”
The CBI says under more facilitative rules enforced in recent months, export activity and, by extension, currency revenue has improved.
Non-oil exporters must bring back a part of their earnings in foreign exchange hawala and sell it via Nima. They also can sell currency to authorized exchange shops.
Most small and medium-sized export companies meet their export repatriation commitment via the “import in lieu for export” mechanism approved in October 2020 as part of efforts to reform rules and ease the cumbersome rules to bringing back export revenue.
Since then exporters use part of their earnings to import goods, raw material and machinery either for their own needs or for a third party under “currency barter between exporters and importers”.
The provision, however, excludes giant export companies such as the petrochemical, steel and petroleum firms because they must sell a big portion of their forex income via Nima.
Rules related to the repatriation of export earnings became tougher after the United Sates abandoned the 2015 Iran nuclear deal and announced new sanctions in the spring of 2018 unleashing a severe shortage of forex as oil exports plunged to historic lows.
