Iran's oil exports plummeting

Here's hoping you had a Merry Christmas.  Even if you checked in with the news yesterday, chances are you didn't hear about the biggest story of the day — a new report from the National Academy of Sciences predicting Iran might cease to be an exporter of oil as soon as 2015.  Oil export revenue is falling 10-12% every year, it says.

While the article is not yet online, news accounts indicate the author focused less on Peak Oil arguments and more on the shoddy management practices of Iran's national oil company — hostile to foreign development, not reinvesting in its production capacity, etc.

The scary take-away statistic:  Oil accounts for nearly two-thirds of the Iranian government's revenue.  What happens when that starts to dry up?

The intriguing take-away argument:  That Iranian leaders are truthful when they say they need nuclear power.

The Daily Reckoning