Iran's central bank lets exporters use Bitcoin, USDT to dodge — SkimNews
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- Central Bank of Iran eased foreign currency controls so exporters can bring overseas earnings home — including through cryptocurrency — and can now finance imports directly without selling foreign currency at official rates through the government's exchange platform.
- Exporters can use Tether's USDT and Bitcoin to settle cross-border transactions through Iranian cryptocurrency exchanges, per the Financial Times, which first reported the policy change.
- US Treasury sanctioned four Iranian crypto exchanges in early June under its "Economic Fury" campaign, and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the US had seized about $1 billion in Iranian crypto assets and directed a freeze of more than $130 million in wallets linked to Iran's central bank by July 14.
- TRM Labs reported in June more than $3.8 billion in flows between crypto exchange CoinEx and sanctioned Iranian entities over more than seven years; CoinEx denied any commercial relationship with the Iranian government or domestic Iranian exchanges.
- Central Bank of Iran did not respond to Cointelegraph's request for comment on the reported policy change.
Why it matters: Iran's central bank is formalizing a channel that US enforcement has spent the past year trying to choke off: four Iranian exchanges sanctioned in June, $1 billion in Iranian crypto assets seized, and $130 million in central-bank-linked wallets frozen. By letting exporters settle trade in USDT and BTC directly, Iran is shifting sanctions evasion from informal crypto rails into an officially sanctioned mechanism — raising the stakes for any exchange still servicing Iranian counterparties.
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