Iran's Strait of Hormuz toll booth has been settling in bitcoin since June

Key Points:

• The U.S. Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) has designated BitBank, a Tehran-based cryptocurrency exchange established in 2024, and its developer, Pishtaz Simorgh Electronic Trade Company, for facilitating Iranian regime financing via cryptocurrencies.
• BitBank reportedly moved hundreds of millions of dollars in bitcoin to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, a U.S.-designated terrorist organization controlling much of Iran's economy.
• Since June, Iran's Hormuz Safe Marine Services Authority, responsible for selling "safe passage" insurance for ships crossing the Strait of Hormuz, has used BitBank to transfer collected funds to regime entities, an arrangement deemed a violation of transit rights under international law.
• The designation freezes BitBank's U.S. assets and prohibits Americans from dealing with it, while secondary sanctions threaten foreign firms processing BitBank transactions with loss of access to the U.S. financial system.
• Unlike previous actions, OFAC did not publish specific cryptocurrency wallet addresses in this designation, which are typically used by compliance teams for screening purposes.