- OFAC added four Tron wallet addresses to the Central Bank of Iran’s sanctions listing on July 14, and Tether froze about US$131 million in USDT held in them.
- Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the US is “committed to disrupting and degrading Iran’s illicit financial activities, including its abuse of digital assets”.
- The action follows an April freeze of US$344.2 million on the same listing and OFAC’s June designation of Iran’s four largest crypto exchanges; Iranian officials had not publicly responded.
US sanctions officials added four Tron wallet addresses to the Central Bank of Iran’s sanctions listing on July 14, and Tether froze about US$131 million (AU$187.33 million) in USDT held in the wallets, the Treasury’s latest action against what it calls Iran’s illicit use of digital assets.
The freeze works in two steps. The Office of Foreign Assets Control designates the addresses on its sanctions list, and Tether, as the token’s issuer, blocks them at the software level, leaving the funds immovable.
The updated listing ties the entry to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ Qods Force and Hizballah, and carries secondary-sanctions risk under Executive Order 13224.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent stated the department is “committed to disrupting and degrading Iran’s illicit financial activities, including its abuse of digital assets”, and pledged to “aggressively follow the money”.
The description of these activities as illicit finance reflects the Treasury’s assessment. Iranian officials had not publicly responded at the time of writing.
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The wallet action extends a US campaign against Iran-linked digital assets running since March 2025.
Tether froze US$344.2 million (AU$492.21 million) in April across two addresses already on the central bank’s listing, and Bessent said in May the US had seized or frozen close to US$1 billion (AU$1.43 billion) in Iran-linked crypto since the campaign began.
Tether says it works with more than 340 law enforcement agencies across 65 countries and has frozen over US$4.4 billion (AU$6.29 billion) in assets to date, including US$2.1 billion (AU$3 billion) tied to US actions, according to its own reporting. The company had not published a statement on this freeze.
The designation landed as hostilities between the US and Iran resumed after a collapsed ceasefire, with strikes reported on both sides.
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