Iran’s Deputy Speaker of Parliament said yesterday that the government had taken advantage of the country’s stock market which has been mostly in the red for the past few days.
“The government has been inadequate, has had misconducts and has taken advantage of the stock market,” Amir Hossein Ghazizadeh said in comments carried by the state-run Mehr News Agency.
He also said, “necessary inquiries should be carried out”.
Speaking to reporters on Saturday, Ghazizadeh said stock market companies’ assets has had a sharp increase despite the lack of economic activity because of liquidity.
“If you see stocks falling it is because of fear in the market, wrong polices, and because large companies take advantage of the stock market so they can buy stocks at a lower price,” said the Deputy Speaker of Parliament.
He said current conditions were not natural.
“If the government and the Stock Exchange Organization had done their jobs, stocks would have surely grown,” he added.
Ghazizadeh claimed that the stock market would improve with the decrease of the exchange rate, and the decline of other markets such as gold and real estate.
“The difference between the (government) exchange rate, 4,200 tomans to the dollar, and the free exchange rate (23,100 tomans) is the main factor behind economic corruption and abuse,” he said.
“In the case of government fixed exchange rate of 4,200 tomans to the dollar and the money that was taken out of people’s pockets went into the pockets of the financially corrupt and in the end, goods were sold to the people with the free exchange rate,” he added.
Ghazizadeh also added that balancing the exchange rate and controlling inflation requires the establishment of an integrated system.
“We should know if there is a proper method for this, and if not, we cannot change the prices ourselves,” he said.
In October 2020, there was a shortage of insulin in pharmacies across Iran. State-run media reported that the Head of Health Economic Commission of the Tehran’s Chamber of Commerce said that insulin was not the only drug smuggled out of the country.
“All expensive drugs are smuggled,” Mahmoud Najafi Arab said.
He said the reason behind the trafficking of medication was due to fixed government exchange rates which enables the import of drugs at low prices. Traffickers then export the drugs at normal exchange rate prices.
In November 2020 and January, stock market investors held several protests for consecutive days to demand their lost savings.
In comments carried by the IRGC affiliated Tasnim News Agency on October 20, 2020 Minister of Finance Dejpasand implied that the government used the stock market to compensate for its budget deficit.
“I would like to inform you that fortunately, as a result of the measures devised by the government, in the last six months, we have been able to make up for the shortfall of our resources from the sale of securities and the transfer of shares of state-owned companies.”
In an October 3, 2020 article, the state-run Aftab-Yazd daily also stated that Iran used the stock market to make up for its deficits.
