An interesting analysis of Iran’s efforts to seek out oil swaps via John C.K. Daly and Energy Daily. As Daly points out, five nations share the Caspian’s coastline — Azerbaijan, Russia, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan and Iran — and, when the Kashagan field comes online, there will be an enormous disparity between production and transit capabilities that Iran is hoping to exploit with its oil swap proposals:

“…Iran’s interest in oil swaps is longstanding, and its proposals have great appeal to Kazakhstan for a number of reasons, both geographical and economic. Oil swaps with Iran bring exports significantly closer to the booming East Asian market. In contrast, tankers above Suezmax capacity loading at Turkey’s Ceyhan Mediterranean port have to transit the Mediterranean and circumnavigate Africa in order to reach Asian customers, significantly adding to transport costs….”

However, as the article concludes, it may actually be Kazakhstan that has adroitly been playing all the other actors out against one other in order to be best positioned.