Talking trade

Part two

So it is one of those weeks on Counting the Cost where we have got a little bit of everything from everywhere. But as I sit here looking over the show’s rundown, late on a Thursday night, I can see a common thread … trade.

Mightn’t sound too exciting, but as with all financial and economic stories there is something in there which affects the everyman.

Let’s start with Iran. Slapped with more UN sanctions despite the best efforts of Turkey and Brazil, it now has to either conform with what the P5+1 and the IAEA wants, or continue doing what it’s done for years – proceed with its nuclear programme and find ways to trade around the sanctions.

The thing with the sanctions is that while the target only specific groups, businesses and individuals within Iran, they bring with them a sort of stigma with doing business with anything Iranian!

Makes it tough for a businessperson in Tehran to expand his or her business, and perhaps negates the argument that these sanctions don’t target the Iranian people. We discuss that this week with Babak Emamian from the British-Iranian Business Association.

Also joining us on the show, Francisco J. Sanchez, the US undersecretary of commerce and trade. He is on a bit of a Middle East tour this week, through Saudi Arabia and Qatar, pushing trade links with this part of the world. 

He dropped by the AJE building in Doha to talk Iran, trade with the Eurozone, and even the BP oil spill which frankly is turning in the most extraordinary business vs government showdown I have seen in a while.

And trade of a different sort too, when we look at France’s so-called “rogue trader” Jerome Kerviel who went on trial this week.

I do not think I am going too far to say that this was France’s Lehmann Brothers or Northern Rock… perhaps not in the sense of a big company taking a big fall, but the trigger point that exposed a system in serious decline. 

Once again, Barbara Serra has kindly filed a special report just for us… you can read her blog from Paris here, or follow her on Twitter here.  Thanks Barbara!

And just to keep up the variety, we have got oil spills and iPhones for you as well. So make sure you join us for Counting the Cost and check us out on Twitter too – @AJCountingCost is the name to look out for.

Counting the Cost can be seen each week at the following times GMT: Friday: 1430, 2030; Saturday: 0430, 1230, 1900; Sunday: 0130, 1630; Monday: 0830; Tuesday: 0600.