No apparent progress was made so far in the latest round of talks to revive the Iran nuclear deal, but US and European officials said negotiations would continue.
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Register NowIf the US and Iran can agree to restart the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, oil sanctions relief as part of the deal could return as much as 1 million b/d to the tight global market that has few options for near-term incremental supply.
The talks restarted June 28 after a three-month lag and moved to Doha, Qatar, where some watchers were optimistic that the host country could help bring the two sides together.
A US State Department spokesperson June 29 said talks would continue but declined to give any further updates.
"As we and our European allies have made clear, we are prepared to immediately conclude and implement the deal we negotiated in Vienna for mutual return to full implementation of the JCPOA," the spokesperson said in an unsigned email. "But for that, Iran needs to decide to drop their additional demands that go beyond the JCPOA."
EU envoy Enrique Mora said the parties had "two intense days of proximity talks in Doha."
"Unfortunately, not yet the progress the EU team as coordinator had hoped for," he said on Twitter. "We will keep working with even greater urgency to bring back on track a key deal for non-proliferation and regional stability."
Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Naser Kanani tweeted that the Tehran and EU negotiators would "be in touch regarding continuation of the path and the next stage of the talks."
Rising June exports
Iranian oil exports rose to 850,000 b/d in June from a 2022 low of 650,000 b/d in May, according to Platts Analytics, a part of S&P Global Commodity Insights.
Platts Analytics saw diminishing odds of a near-term deal the longer the stalemate persisted, while risks from regional tensions have increased.
The Eurasia Group remains skeptical that a breakthrough will be reached this year, especially as the US midterm elections in November shrinks the "political space" to strike a deal.
Helima Croft, RBC Capital Markets managing director of global commodity strategy research, said sanctions relief for Iranian exports could become key to easing persistently tight global oil supplies.
"Every barrel matters in this market," she told a Carnegie Endowment for International Peace event June 28.
But US political challenges and a long lag time for Iran to get back into compliance with the JCPOA mean that increasing Iranian exports could take a long time, Croft said.
"Even in a scenario where we were to get a breakthrough, it's not a light switch," Croft said. "That's something that oftentimes the market participants don't fully get - that you can't just say, "OK, JCPOA 2.0, and tomorrow I got an additional million barrels on the market."