US Sanctions BitBank for Facilitating Payments through Strait of Hormuz
The United States has imposed sanctions on BitBank, an Iranian cryptocurrency exchange used to process payments from vessels passing through the Strait of Hormuz. The exchange is controlled by Babak Zanjani, a U.S.-designated Iranian billionaire and business magnate who was sanctioned in January for financially backing projects supporting Iran's elite Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
The Treasury Department said that BitBank has processed large volumes of funds for IRGC-linked entities, and the Hormuz Safe Marine Services Authority has used the exchange to transfer payments it received from vessels passing through the strait since June. Along with BitBank, its developer Pishtaz Simorgh Electronic Trade Company, and three Zanjani associates were also sanctioned.
The sanctions block all property and interests in property of those designated, and generally prohibit U.S. persons from doing business with them. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said that the designations 'make perfectly clear that efforts to finance the Iranian regime using cryptocurrencies are not beyond our reach.'