Treasury targets Iran’s crypto sector; freezes nearly $1B

The U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control on Aug. 24 designated Iran’s digital asset sector as sanctionable under Executive Order 13902, granting authority to impose measures across the sector rather than only on individual actors. Since April, Treasury operations under Operation Economic Fury have frozen or sanctioned roughly $1 billion in cryptocurrency connected to Iran.

Stablecoin issuer Tether blocked about $344 million in USDT in April and another $131 million in July after Treasury flagged central bank-controlled wallets that held more than $165 million in stablecoins. In June, OFAC added four Iranian exchanges-Nobitex, Wallex, Bitpin and Ramzinex-and two Nobitex executives to its sanctions list.

Blockchain analytics firms estimate Iran’s on-chain ecosystem reached roughly $7.8 billion last year. Analysts report that wallets tied to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps accounted for more than half of Iran-linked on-chain activity in the fourth quarter. Separate analysis traced at least $507 million in USDT purchases by Iran’s central bank to leaked 2025 documents; much of those stablecoins moved through Nobitex and then over a cross-chain bridge after a mid-2025 hack.

Officials and researchers say the central bank’s accumulation of USDT served as a reserve outside the traditional dollar system to support the rial, which has lost about 90% of its value in recent years.

Iranian actors have used a range of crypto techniques to move and preserve value. Authorities have charged fees in cryptocurrency for ships passing through the Strait of Hormuz. The IRGC has taken advantage of heavily subsidized domestic electricity to mine Bitcoin. The use of cross-chain bridges and decentralized tools made some flows harder to trace until analysts identified the transfers.

The Aug. 24 sanctions package also included action against a broker accused of routing more than $100 million in cryptocurrency tied to oil sales for the IRGC’s Quds Force. Treasury officials said the measures target transactions, platforms and service providers that facilitate Iran-linked digital-asset flows.

The Treasury statement quoted Secretary Scott Bessent: “Our objective is to sever every economic lifeline that sustains this tyrannical regime until Tehran stands alone.”

Public enforcement actions to date have focused on freezing wallets, blocking transactions and sanctioning intermediaries after on-chain analysis linked those services to sanctioned Iranian entities. Improved blockchain analytics have been used to trace and identify those connections.