Washington – For the first time since the Islamic Revolution of 1979, the Iranian economy is under tremendous stress, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani admitted. The Iranian President accused the United States of being responsible for the wretched state of the country’s economy. To bail out the crisis-hit economy owing to the US sanctions, Iran has announced a gold-backed cryptocurrency although the country was speculated to make the announcement since some time. It is Iran’s first step to challenge the dollar-based international system and retaliate against the US sanctions. A reaction from the United States is anticipated on the matter.
An Iranian English daily reported the story. The cryptocurrency is named ‘Peyman’. Also, four main banks as also a private company has taken the initiative to build the Iranian cryptocurrency. The banks include the Persian Bank, Bank Pasargad, Bank Melli Iran and Bank Mellat. Along with these banks the Iranian Ghoghnoos Company took the initiative in helping to launch the cryptocurrency. The Peyman cryptocurrency would thus be available with all the four banks. Peyman will be used to tokenise banks’ assets and excess properties, Valiollah Fatemi, a Ghoghnoos director stated.
The Peyman can function like a wallet or a payment channel. Technology will streamline the regular financial transactions and accelerate the pace of bank transactions, claimed Fatemi. ‘Considering the need of the Iranian economy, 1 billion units of Peyman would be launched initially. The new currency would also be hosted by an ‘over-the-counter’ exchange for the stock market, once the bank transactions settle well, Ghoghnoos stated.
Given the US-imposed sanctions, Iran was expected to announce the cryptocurrency. The sanctions have made financial transactions with Iran difficult. Furthermore, the situation for Iran worsened when the United States prohibited financial intermediaries such as SWIFT, alternatives European countries had proposed for trade, from offering their services to the state. Iran is therefore said to have launched the gold-backed Peyman cryptocurrency to bypass the US Dollar and sanctions as also to continue with international transactions.
Remarkably, the Iranian central bank had announced the regulations for the use of cryptocurrency only a week before the launch of the Peyman. With the announcement, Iran indicated the launch of a cryptocurrency.
EU sets up INSTEX, a new payment system with Iran to evade US sanctions
Brussels: France, Germany and the United Kingdom have set up the ‘INSTEX’ (Instrument in Support of Trade Exchanges), an alternative payment system for transactions with Iran. The European countries claim that INSTEX would help bypass the US sanctions.
The INSTEX would streamline the trade cooperation between the European countries and Iran once again. However, the channel is believed would be used only transactions related to food, medicines and medical devices.
Click below to express your thoughts and views on this news:
 |
https://twitter.com/WW3Info |
 |
https://www.facebook.com/WW3Info |
