Iranian companies are increasingly using cryptocurrency for cross-border payments as U.S. sanctions restrict conventional banking channels, with the Central Bank of Iran reportedly tolerating cryptocurrency settlement for export payments. According to The Financial Times, "Receiving export payments in crypto has now become completely normalized," an executive at a government-linked company told the publication. USDT is reportedly the most commonly used cryptocurrency for Iranian cross-border commercial payments, with businesses converting foreign currency through open markets or using export revenue directly to purchase imports. This represents a significant shift from Iran's traditional foreign-exchange system, which required companies to return foreign earnings through state-supervised channels often at below-market exchange rates.
The US Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) has classified Iran's digital asset sector as sanctionable, formalizing years of enforcement against Tehran's sanctions evasion using Bitcoin (BTC) and the stablecoin Tether (USDT). According to Chainalysis, Iran's crypto ecosystem topped $7.8 billion last year, with wallets tied to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) accounting for more than half of on-chain activity in the fourth quarter. Blockchain analytics firm Elliptic reported that Iran's central bank acquired at least $507 million in USDT, tracing the purchases to leaked 2025 documents. Most of the stablecoin flowed through Nobitex, the country's largest exchange, before shifting to a cross-chain bridge after a mid-2025 hack. Researchers describe this setup as a sanction-resistant reserve built outside the traditional dollar system to defend the rial, which has lost close to 90% of its value amid inflation and sanctions.
TRM Labs attributed approximately $9.9 billion in cryptocurrency volume to Iran during 2025, with USDT being the most widely used asset for cross-border commercial payments. As reported by The Financial Times, Iranian users employ digital assets for several purposes, including savings, trading and cross-border payments, with USDT offering exposure to the U.S. dollar without requiring access to a dollar-denominated bank account. Tron is widely used for USDT transfers because of its relatively low transaction fees, while Bitcoin mining provides another crypto channel, with Elliptic estimating in 2021 that Iran accounted for about 4.5% of global Bitcoin mining. The total volume was lower than approximately $11.4 billion recorded in 2024, but TRM said the sustained activity reflected structural demand rather than purely speculative trading.
The Central Bank was able to freeze approximately $344 million worth of USDT that was linked to it, demonstrating the effectiveness of sanctions enforcement. Monthly inflows into crypto exchanges dropped from a high of $2.1 billion at the end of 2024 to just over $510 million during Q1 2026, as reported by AMBCrypto. The Central Bank imposed sanctions on four prominent Iranian cryptocurrency exchanges, with TRM estimating that these four exchanges handled about $7.7 billion, or 78%, of Iran's attributed cryptocurrency volume during 2025. Connectivity disruptions added further pressure, briefly cutting platform volumes by roughly 80%, yet USDT remained central to surviving cross-border flows, especially through low-cost TRON transfers. This suggests that although enforcement may be limiting access to certain settlement alternatives, there remains significant demand for such alternatives.
Iranian officials are seeking the return of export proceeds held outside the country, with more than 20,000 individuals and companies allegedly failing to repatriate approximately €94 billion, according to figures cited by The Financial Times. The reported changes include allowing exporters to repatriate overseas funds through domestic cryptocurrency exchanges, reducing their reliance on Iran's official foreign-exchange system. However, U.S. sanctions block Iranian digital asset exchanges and may expose foreign counterparties to penalties, with OFAC stating that non-U.S. financial institutions and other foreign persons may face sanctions for materially supporting designated Iranian exchanges. The distinction matters because tolerance by officials does not necessarily provide businesses with legal certainty, while policies could change and transactions may still face domestic reporting, tax or foreign-exchange requirements.
