$61 Million in Crypto Seized as DOJ Targets Iranian Oil Money Laundering on Binance
The US Department of Justice has filed a civil forfeiture complaint against approximately $61 million in cryptocurrency allegedly linked to black-market sales of Iranian crude oil and petroleum products. The funds were intended to finance the Iranian government and its military, including the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), a designated terrorist organization.
Prosecutors say two Chinese companies, Blessed Trust and Hexa Whale, used Binance trading accounts to launder the money and funnel it to Iran. The two firms provided on-ramp services converting fiat into crypto, in some cases through US-based issuers, and both count Chinese petroleum companies among their clients.
According to investigators, a set of interrelated unhosted addresses, collectively called 'Entity A,' have received and distributed over $1.5 billion in illicit Iranian oil proceeds. Blessed Trust and Hexa Whale facilitated much of this flow through transactions designed to obscure the source and ownership of the funds.